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THE RETURN 


BY 


WALTER DE LA MARE 

»> 

AUTHOR OF “ HENRY BROCKEN,” ETC. 


“ Look not for roses in Attains his garden, or wholesome flowers in a venom- 
ous plantation. And since there is scarce any one bad, but some others are 
the worse for him ; tempt not contagion by proximity, and hazard not thyself 
in the shadow of corruption.” — Sir Thomas Browne. .. 



G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 
XLbc ‘ftnicftcrbocftcr iprese 

1911 





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CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

I. 

The Transformation . 

PAGE 

1 

II. 

The Dreaded Interview 

. 17 

III. 

Reviewing the Facts . 

• 34 

IV. 

Isolated .... 

. 46 

V. 

The Morning After 

. 51 

VI. 

The Promptings of the Other 

* 74 

VII. 

Father and Daughter . 

• 93 

VIII. 

The Overmastering Desire . 

. 106 

IX. 

A Visit to the Graveyard . 

• 113 

X. 

Dominated by the Indweller 

. 122 

XI. 

The Haunted House 

. 132 

XII. 

Reincarnation 

. 150 

XIII. 

Winning Through. 

. 167 

XIV. 

The Rift of the Years 

. 177 

XV. 

The Retreat of the Intruder 

. 197 


iii 


IV 


Contents 


CHAPTER PAGE 


XVI. 

The Understanding of Sympathy . 

215 

XVII. 

A New Explanation 

229 

XVIII. 

Lawford's Perplexity . 

247 

XIX. 

The Empty House 

263 

XX. 

Glimpses of the Unremembered . 

277 

XXI. 

The Parting . . 

295 

XXII. 

Lawford’s Case is Discussed 

307 

XXIII. 

An Old Lady’s Visit 

334 


THE RETURN 



I 



THE RETURN 


CHAPTER I 

THE TRANSFORMATION 

The churchyard in which Arthur Lawford found 
himself wandering that mild and golden Septem- 
ber afternoon was old, green, and refreshingly 
still. The silence in which it lay seemed as keen 
and mellow as the light — the pale, almost heatless, 
sunlight that filled the air. Here and there robins 
sang across the stones, elvishly shrill in the peace 
of harvest. The only other living creature there 
seemed to Lawford to be his own rather fair, not 
unsubstantial, rather languid self, who at the 
noise of the birds had raised his head and glanced 
as if between content and incredulity across his 
still and solitary surroundings. An increasing 
inclination for such lonely ramblings, together 
with the feeling that his continued ill-health had 
grown a little irksome to his wife, and that now 
that he was really better she would be relieved 


2 


The Return 


at his absence, had induced him to wander on 
from home without much considering where the 
quiet lanes were leading him. And in spite of a 
peculiar melancholy that had welled up into his 
mind during these last few days, he had certainly 
smiled with a faint sense of the irony of things on 
lifting his eyes in an unusually depressed moodiness 
to find himself looking down on the shadows and 
peace of Widderstone. With that anxious irre- 
solution which illness so often brings in its train 
he had hesitated for what must have been some 
few minutes before actually entering the grave- 
yard. But once safely within he had begun to 
feel extremely loth to think of turning back again, 
and this not the less at remembering with a real 
foreboding that it was now drawing towards 
evening, that another day was nearly done. He 
trailed his umbrella behind him over the grass- 
grown paths ; staying here and there to read some 
time-worn inscription ; stooping a little broodingly 
over the dark green graves. Not for the first time 
during the long, laborious convalescence that had 
followed apparently so slight an indisposition, a 
fleeting sense almost as if of an unintelligible 
remorse had overtaken him, a vague thought that 
behind all these past years, hidden as it were from 
his success, lay something not yet quite reckoned 
with. How often as a boy had he been rapped 
into a galvanic activity out of those deep reveries 
he used to fall into — those fits of a kind of fishlike 


The Transformation 


3 


day-dream. How often, and even far beyond 
boyhood, had he found himself bent on some dis- 
tant thought or fleeting vision that the sudden 
clash of self-possession had made to seem quite 
illusory, and yet had left so strangely haunting. 
And now the old habit had stirred out of its long 
sleep, and, through the gate that Influenza in 
departing had left ajar, had returned upon him. 

‘‘But I suppose we are all pretty much the same, 
if we only knew it,’’ he had consoled himself. 
“We keep our crazy side to ourselves; that ’s all. 
We just go on for years and years doing and 
saying whatever happens to come up — and really 
keen about it too ” — ^he had glanced up with a kind 
of challenge in his face at the squat little belfry — 
“and then, without the slightest reason or warn- 
ing, down you go, and it all begins to wear thin, 
and you get wondering what on earth it all means. ” 
Memory slipped back for an instant to the life 
that in so unusual a fashion seemed to have 
floated a little aloof. Fortunately he had not 
discussed these inward symptoms with his wife. 
How surprised Sheila would be to see him loafing 
in this old, crooked churchyard! How she would 
lift her dark eyebrows, with that handsome, in- 
different tolerance! He smiled, but a little con- 
fusedly; yet the thought gave even a spice of 
adventure to the evening’s ramble. 

He loitered on, scarcely thinking at all now, 
stooping here and there. These faint, listless 


4 


The Return 


ideas made no more stir than the sunlight gilding 
the fading leaves, the crisp turf underfoot. With 
a slight effort he stooped even once again: 

“Stranger, a moment pause, and stay; 

In this dim chamber hidden away 
Lies one who once found life as dear 
As now he finds his slumber here; 

Pray, then, the Judgment but increase 
His deep, his everlasting peace! ” 

‘^But then, how do you know you lie at peace?’' 
Lawford audibly questioned, gazing at the dog- 
gerel. And yet, as his eye wandered over the 
blunt green stone and the rambling, crimson- 
berried brier that had almost encircled it with its 
thorns, the echo of that whisper rather jarred. 
He was, he supposed, rather a dull creature — at 
least people seemed to think so — and he seldom 
felt at ease even with his own small facetiousness. 
Besides, just that kind of question was getting 
very common. Now that cleverness was the 
fashion most people were clever — even perfect 
fools; and cleverness after all was often only a 
bore: all head and no body. He turned languidly 
to the small cross-shaped stone on the other side. 

“ Here lies the body of Ann Hard, who died in child- 
bed. Also of James, her infant son.” 

He muttered the words over with a kind of 
mournful bitterness. “That’s just it — just it; 


The Transformation 


5 


that ’s just how it goes!” He yawned softly; the 
pathway had come to an end. Beyond him lay 
ranker grass, one and another obscurer mounds, 
an old scarred oak seat, shadowed by a few ever- 
lastingly green cypresses and coral-fruited yew- 
trees. And above and beyond all hung a pale 
blue arch of sky with a few voyaging clouds like 
silvered wool, and the calm, wide curves of stubble 
field and pasture land. He stood with vacant 
eyes, not in the least aware how queer a figure 
he made with his gloves and his umbrella and his 
hat among the stained and tottering gravestones. 
Then, just to linger out his hour, and half sunken 
in reverie, he walked slowly over to the few solitary 
graves beneath the cypresses. 

One only was commemorated with a tombstone, 
a rather unusual oval-headed stone, carved at 
each corner into what might be the heads of 
angels, or of pagan dryads, blindly facing each 
other with worn-out, sightless faces. A low, 
curved stone canopy arched over the grave with 
a crevice so wide between its stones that Lawford 
actually bent down and slid in his gloved fingers 
between them. He straightened himself with a 
sigh, and followed with extreme difficulty the 
well-nigh, illegible inscription: 

“Here lie ye bones of one, 

Nicholas Sabathier, a Stranger to this Parish, 
who fell by his own hand on ye 
Eve of St. Michael and All Angels, mdccxxxix.” 


6 


The Return 


Of the date he was a little uncertain. The 
“hand” had lost its “n” and “d”; and all the 
“Angels” rain had erased. He was not quite 
sure even of the “Stranger.” There was a great 
rich “S,” and the twisted tail of a “g”; and, 
whether or no, Lawford smilingly thought, he is 
no Stranger now. But how rare and how memor- 
able a name ! French evidently ; probably Hugue- 
not. And the Huguenots, he remembered vaguely 
were a rather remarkable “crowd.” He had, he 
thought, even played at “Huguenots” once, with 
blood immeasurable spilt at twilight. What was 
the man’s name ? Coligny ; yes, of course, Coligny . 
“And I suppose,” Lawford continued, muttering 
to himself, “I suppose this poor beggar was put 
here out of the way. They might, you know, ” he 
added confidentially, raising the ferrule of his 
umbrella, “they might have stuck a stake through 
you, and buried you at the cross-roads!” And 
again a feeling of ennui^ a faint disgust at his 
poor little witticism, clouded over his mind. It 
was a pity thoughts always ran the easiest way, 
like water in old ditches. 

“ ‘ Here lie ye bones of one, Nicholas Saba- 
thier,’ ” he began murmuring again — “merely 
bones, mind you; brains and heart are quite 
another story. And it ’s pretty certain the fellow 
had some kind of brains. Besides, poor devil! he 
killed himself. That seems to hint at brains. . . . 
Oh, for goodness’ sake!” he cried out; so loud that 


The Transformation 


7 


the sound of his voice alarmed even a robin that 
had perched on a twig almost within touch, with 
glittering eye intent above its dim red breast on 
this other and even rarer stranger. 

'‘I wonder if it is xxxix.; it might be Lxxix.” 
Lawford cast a cautious glance over his round, 
grey shoulder, then laboriously knelt down 
beside the stone, and peeped into the gaping 
cranny. There he encountered merely the tiny, 
pale-green, faintly conspicuous eyes of a large 
spider, confronting his own. It was for the 
moment an alarming, and yet a faintly fascinating 
experience. The little, almost colourless, fires 
remained so changeless. But still, even when at 
last they had actually vanished into the recesses 
of that quiet habitation, Lawford did not rise 
from his knees. An utterly unreasonable feeling 
of dismay, a sudden weakness and weariness had 
come over him. 

“What is the good of it all?” he asked himself 
inconsequently — this monotonous, restless, stupid 
life to which he was soon to be returning, and for 
good. He began to realise how ludicrous a spec- 
tacle he must be, kneeling here amid the weeds 
and grass beneath the solemn cypresses. “Well, 
you can’t have everything,” seemed loosely to 
express his disquiet. 

He stared vacantly at the green and fretted 
gravestone, dimly aware that his heart was beating 
with an unusual effort. He felt ill and weak. 


8 


The Return 


He leant his hand on the stone and lifted himself 
on to the low wooden seat near by. He drew off 
his glove and thrust his bare hand under his 
waistcoat, with his mouth a little ajar, and his 
eyes fixed on the dark, square turret, its bell 
sharply defined against the evening sky. 

“Dead!” a bitter inward voice seemed to break 
into speech; “Dead!” The viewless air seemed 
to be flocking with hidden listeners. The very 
clearness and the crystal silence were their am- 
bush. He alone seemed to be the target of cold 
and hostile scrutiny. There seemed to be not a 
breath to breathe in this crisp, pale sunshine. It 
was all too rare, too thin. The shadows lay like 
wings everlastingly folded. The robin that had 
been his only living witness lifted its throat, and 
broke, as if from the uttermost outskirts of reality, 
into its shrill, passionless song. Lawford moved 
heavy eyes from one object to another — ^bird — 
sun-gilded stone — those two small earth-worn 
faces — ^his hands — a stirring in the grass as of 
some creature labouring to climb up. It was 
useless to sit here any longer. He must go back 
now. Fancies were all very well for a change, 
but must be only occasional guests in a world 
devoted to reality. He leaned his hand on the 
dark grey wood, and closed his eyes. The lids 
presently unsealed a little, momentarily revealing 
astonished, aggrieved pupils, and softly, slowly 
they again descended. 


The Transformation 


9 


The flaming rose that had swiftly surged from 
the west into the zenith, dyeing all the church- 
yard grass a wild and vivid green, and the stooping 
stones above it a pure faint purple, waned softly 
back like a falling fountain into its basin. In a 
few minutes only a faint orange burned in the 
west, dimly illuminating with its band of light the 
huddled flgure on his low wooden seat, his right 
hand still pressed against a faintly beating heart. 
Dusk gathered; the first white stars appeared; 
out of the shadowy fields a nightjar purred. 
But there was only the silence of the falling dew 
among the graves. Down here, under the ink- 
black cypresses, the blades of the grass were 
stooping with cold drops; and darkness lay like 
the hem of an enormous cloak, whose jewels above 
the breast of its wearer might be in the unfathom- 
able clearness the glittering constellations. 

In his small cage of darkness Lawford shud- 
dered and raised a furtive head. He stood up and 
peered eagerly and strangely from side to side. 
He stayed quite still, listening as raptly as some 
wandering night-beast to the indiscriminate stir 
and echoings of the darkness. He cocked his 
head above his shoulder and listened again, then 
turned upon the soundless grass towards the hill. 
He felt not the faintest astonishment or strange- 
ness in his solitude here; only a little chilled, and 
physically uneasy; and yet in this vast darkness 
a faint spiritual exaltation seemed to hover. He 


lO 


The Return 


hastened up the narrow path, walking with knees 
a little bent, like an old labourer who has lived a 
life of stooping, and came out into the dry and 
dusty lane. One moment his instinct hesitated 
as to which turn to take — only a moment ; he was 
soon walking swiftly, almost trotting, downhill 
with this vivid exultation in the huge dark night 
in his heart, and Sheila merely a little, angry, 
Titianesque cloud on a scarcely perceptible hori- 
zon. He had no notion of the time; the golden 
hands of his watch were indiscernible in the gloom. 
And presently, as he passed by, he pressed his 
face close to the cold glass of a little shop-window, 
and saw the time there by an old Swiss cuckoo- 
clock. He would if he hurried just be home 
before dinner. 

He broke into a low, steady trot, gaining speed 
as he ran on, vaguely elated to find how well his 
breath was serving him. An odd smile darkened 
his face at remembrance of the thoughts he had 
been thinking. There could be little amiss with 
the heart of a man who could shamble along like 
this, taking even a pleasure, an increasing pleas- 
ure, in this long, wolf-like stride. He turned 
round occasionally to look into the face of some 
fellow-wayfarer whom he had overtaken, for he 
felt not only this unusual animation, this peculiar 
zest, but that, like a boy on some secret errand, 
he had slightly disguised his very presence, was 
going masked, as it were. Even his clothes seemed 


The Transformation 


II 


to have connived at this queer illusion. No 
tailor had for these ten years allowed him so much 
latitude. He cautiously at last opened his garden 
gate and with soundless agility mounted the six 
stone steps, his latch-key ready in his gloveless 
hand, and softly let himself into the house. 

Sheila was out, it seemed, for the maid had for- 
gotten to light the lamp. Without pausing to 
take off his great-coat, he hung up his hat. ran 
nimbly upstairs, and knocked with a light knuckle 
on his bedroom door. It was closed, but no 
answer came. He opened it, shut it, locked it, 
and sat down on the bedside for a moment, in the 
darkness, breathless and elated. There was little 
the matter with his heart now. It beat hard, 
but vigorously and equably, so that he could 
scarcely hear any other sound, as he sat erect 
and still, like some night animal, wary of danger, 
attentively alert. Then he rose from the bed, 
threw off his coat, which was clammy with 
dew, and lit a candle on the dressing-table. 

Its narrow flame lengthened, drooped, bright- 
ened, gleamed clearly. He glanced around him, 
unusually contented — at the ruddiness of the low 
fire, the brass bedstead, the warm red curtains, 
the soft silveriness here and there. It seemed as 
if a heavy and dull dream had withdrawn out of 
his mind. He would go again some day, and sit 
on the little hard seat beside the crooked tomb- 
stone of the friendless old Huguenot. He opened 


12 


The Return 


a drawer, took out his razors, and, faintly whis- 
tling, returned to the table and lit a second candle. 
And still with this strange heightened sense of 
life stirring in his mind, he drew his hand gently 
over his chin and looked into the glass. 

For an instant he stood head to foot icily still, 
without the least feeling, or thought, or stir — 
staring into the looking-glass. Then an incon- 
ceivable drumming beat on his ear. A warm 
surge, like the onset of a wave, broke upward, 
flooding neck, face, forehead, even his hands with 
colour. He caught himself up and wheeled delib- 
erately, completely round, his eyes darting to and 
fro, suddenly to fix themselves in a prolonged 
stare, while he took a deep dreath, caught back 
his self-possession and paused. Then he turned 
and once more confronted the changed strange 
face in the glass. 

Without a sound he drew up a chair and sat 
down, just as he was, frigid and appalled, at the 
foot of the bed. To sit like this, with a kind of 
incredibly swift torrent of consciousness, bearing 
thoughts like straws and bubbles on its surface, 
could not be called thinking. Some stealthy key 
had simply opened the sluice of memory. And 
words, voices, faces of mockery streamed through, 
without connection, tendency, or sense. His 
hands hung between his knees, a deep and settled 
frown darkened his face, stooping out of the direct 
rays of the light, and his eyes wandered like 


The Transformation 


13 

busy and inquisitive, but stupid, animals over 
the floor. 

If, in that flood of unintelligible thoughts, any- 
thing clearly recurred at all, it was the memory 
of Sheila. He saw her face, lit, transflgured, 
distorted, stricken, appealing, horrified. His lids 
narrowed; a vague terror and horror mastered 
him. He hid his eyes in his hands and cried 
without sound, without tears, without hope, like 
a desolate child. He ceased crying ; and sat with- 
out stirring. And it seemed after an age of 
vacancy and meaninglessness he heard a door 
shut downstairs, a distant voice, and then the 
rustle of some one slowly ascending the stairs. 
Some one turned the handle; in vain; tapped. 
‘Ts that you, Arthur?’^ 

For an instant Lawford paused, then like a 
child listening for an echo, answered, ^‘Yes, 
Sheila.” And a sigh broke from him; his voice, 
except for a little huskiness, was singularly 
unchanged. 

^‘May I come in?” Lawford stood softly up 
and glanced once more into the glass. His lips 
set tight, and a slight frown settled between the 
long, narrow, intensely dark eyes. 

“Just one moment, Sheila, ” he answered slowly, 
“just one moment.” 

“How long will you be?” 

He stood erect and raised his voice, gazing the 
while impassively into the glass. 


14 


The Return 


^Tt ’s no use,” he began, as if repeating a les- 
son, ^‘it *s no use your asking me, Sheila. Please 
give me a moment, a — I am not quite myself, 
dear, ” he added quite gravely. 

The faintest hint of vexation was in the answer. 

^^What is the matter? Can’t I help? It ’s so 
very absiurd ” 

‘^What is absurd?” he asked dully. 

‘‘Why, standing like this outside my own 
bedroom door. Are you ill? I will send for 
Dr. Simon.” 

“Please, Sheila, do nothing of the kind. I am 
not ill. I merely want a little time to think.” 
There was again a brief pause; and then a little 
rattling at the handle. 

“Arthur, I insist on knowing at once what ’s 
wrong; this does not sound a bit like yourself. 
It is not even quite like your own voice. ” 

“It is myself,” he replied stubbornly, staring 
fixedly into the glass. “You must give me a few 
moments, Sheila. Something has happened. My 
face. Come back in an hour. ” 

“Don’t be absurd; it ’s simply wicked to talk 
like that. How do I know what you are doing? 
As if I can leave you for an hour in uncertainty! 
Your face! If you don’t open at once I shall 
believe there ’s something seriously wrong ; I 
shall send Ada for assistance.” 

“If you do that Sheila, it will be disastrous. 
I cannot answer for the con — Go quietly 


The Transformation 


15 


downstairs. Say I am unwell; don’t wait dinner 
for me; come back in an hour; oh, half an hour!” 

The answer broke out angrily. “You must be 
mad, beside yourself, to ask such a thing. I shall 
wait in the next room until you call.” 

“Wait where you please,” Lawford replied, 
“but tell them downstairs.” 

“Then if I tell them to wait until half -past 
eight, you will come down? You say you are not 
ill; the dinner will be ruined. It ’s absurd. ” 

Lawford made no answer. He listened awhile, 
then he deliberately sat down once more to try to 
think. Like a squirrel in a cage his mind seemed 
to be aimlessly, unceasingly astir. “What is it 
really? What is it really? — really?” He sat 
there and it seemed to him his body was trans- 
parent as glass. It seemed he had no body at all — 
only the memory of an hallucinatory reflection in 
the glass, and this inward voice crying, arguing, 
questioning, threatening out of the silence — 
“What is it really — really — reaPy?^^ And at last, 
cold, wearied out, he rose once more and leaned 
between the two long candle-flames, and stared on 
— on — on, into the glass. He gave that long, 
dark face that had been foisted on him tricks to 
do — lift an eyebrow, frown. There was scarcely 
any perceptible pause between the wish and its 
performance. He found to his discomfiture that 
the face answered instantaneously to the slightest 
emotion, even to his fainter secondary thoughts; 


i6 


The Return 


as if these unfamiliar features were not entirely 
within control. He could not, in fact, without 
the glass before him, tell precisely what that face 
was expressing. He was still, it seemed, keenly 
sane. That he would discover for certain when 
Sheila returned. Terror, rage, horror had fallen 
back. If only he felt ill, or was in pain; he would 
have rejoiced at it. He was simply caught in 
some unheard-of snare — caught, how? when? 
where? by whom? 


CHAPTER II 


THE DREADED INTERVIEW 

But the coolness and deliberation of his scrutiny 
had to a certain extent calmed Lawford's mind 
and given him confidence. Hitherto he had met 
the little difficulties of life only to vanquish them 
with ease and applause. . Now he was standing 
face to face with the unknown. He burst out 
laughing, into a long, low, helpless laughter. 
Then he arose and began to walk softly, swiftly, 
to and fro across the room — from wall to wall seven 
paces, and at the fourth, that awful, unseen, 
brightly-lit profile passed as swiftly over the 
tranquil surface of the looking-glass. The power 
of concentration was gone again. He simply 
paced on mechanically, listening to a Babel of 
questions, a conflicting medley of answers. But 
above all the confusion and turmoil of his brain, 
as the boatswain’s whistle rises above a storm, 
so sounded that same infinitesimal voice, inces- 
santly repeating another question now, ‘‘What are 
you going to do? What are you going to do?” 

And in the midst of this confusion, out of the 
2 17 


i8 


The Return 


infinite, as it were, came another sharp tap at the 
door, and all within sank to utter stillness again. 

“It’s nearly half -past eight, Arthur; I can’t 
wait any longer. ” 

Lawford cast a last fleeting look into the glass, 
turned, and confronted the closed door. “Very 
well, Sheila, you shall not wait any longer.” He 
crossed over to the door, and suddenly a vehement 
idea flashed into his mind. 

He tapped on the panel. “Sheila,” he said 
softly, “I want you first, before you come in, to 
get me something out of my old writing-desk in 
the smoking-room. Here is the key. ’ ’ He pushed 
beneath the door a tiny key from off the ring 
he carried. “In the third little drawer from the 
top, on the left side, is a letter; please don’t say 
anything now. It is the letter you wrote me, 
you will remember, after I had asked you to 
marry me. You scribbled in the comer under 
your signature the initials ‘Y. S. O. A.’ — do you 
remember ? They meant , Y ou Silly Old Arthur ! — 
do you remember? Will you please get that 
letter at once?” 

“Arthur,” answered the voice from without, 
empty of all expression, “what does all this mean, 
this mystery, this hopeless nonsense about a silly 
letter? What has happened? Is this a miserable 
form of persecution? Are you mad? — I refuse 
to get the letter. ” 

Lawford stooped, black and angular, against the 


The Dreaded Interview 


19 


door. am not mad. Oh, I am in the dead- 
liest earnest, Sheila. You must get the letter, 
if only for your own peace of mind.” He heard 
his wife hesitate as she turned. He heard a sob. 
And once more he waited. 

'T have brought the letter,” came the low 
toneless voice again. 

“Have you opened it?” 

There was a rustle of paper. “Are the letters 
there — imderlined three times — *Y. S. O. A.’ ? ” 

“The letters are there.” 

“And the date of the month is underneath, 
^ April 3rd.’ No one else in the whole world, 
living or dead, could know of this but ourselves, 
Sheila?” 

“Will you please open the door?” 

“No one?” 

“I suppose not — no one.” 

“Then come in.” He unlocked the door and 
opened it. A dark, rather handsome woman, with 
sleek hair, in a silk dress of a dark rich colour 
entered. Lawford closed the door. But his face 
was in shadow. He had still a moment’s respite. 

“I need not ask you to be patient,” he began 
quickly; “if I could possibly have spared you — 
if there had been anybody in the world to go to. 
... I am in a horrible, horrible trouble, Sheila. 
It is inconceivable. I said I was sane: so I am, 
but the fact is, I went out for a walk; it was rather 
stupid, perhaps, so soon; and I think I was taken 


20 


The Return 


ill, or something — my heart. A kind of fit, a 
nervous fit. Possibly I am a little imstrung, and 
it ’s all, it ’s mainly fancy; but I think, I can’t 
help thinking it has a little distorted — changed 
my face; everything, Sheila; except, of course, 
myself. Would you mind looking?” He walked 
slowly and with face averted towards the dressing- 
table. 

“Simply a nervous — to make such a fuss, to 
scare!” began his wife, following him. 

Without a word he took up the two old china 
candlesticks, and held them, one in each lank- 
fingered hand, before his face and turned. 

Lawford could see his wife — every tint and 
curve and line as distinctly as she could see him. 
Her cheeks never had much colour; now her 
whole face visibly darkened, from pallor to a 
dusky leaden grey, as she gazed. It was not an 
illusion, then ; not a miserable hallucination. The 
unbelievable, the inconceivable, had happened. 
He replaced the candles with trembling fingers, 
and sat down. 

“Well,” he said, ^‘what is it really; what is it 
really, Sheila? What on earth are we to 
do?” 

“ Is the door locked?” she whispered. He nod- 
ded. With eyes fixed stirlessly on his face, Sheila 
unsteadily seated herself, a little out of the candle- 
light, in the shadow. Lawford rose and put the 
key of the door on his wife’s little rosewood 


The Dreaded Interview 


21 


prayer-desk at her elbow, and deliberately sat 
down again. 

“You said ‘a fit* — where?** 

“I suppose — ^is — is it very different — hope- 
less? You will understand my being. . . . O 
Sheila, what am I to do?** His wife sat perfectly 
still, watching him with unflinching attention. 

“You gave me to imderstand — ‘a nervous 
fit*; where?** 

Lawford took a deep breath, and quietly faced 
her again. “In the old churchyard, Widder- 
stone; I was looking at — at the gravestones.** 
“A fit; in the old churchyard, Widderstone — 
you were ‘looking at the gravestones*? ** 

Lawford shut his mouth. “I suppose so — a 
fit,** he said presently. “My heart went a little 
queer, and I sat down and fell into a kind of doze 
— a stupor, I suppose. I don*t remember anything 
more. And then I woke; like this. ** 

“How do you know?** 

“How do I know what?** 

“ ‘Like that.* ** 

He turned slowly towards the looking-glass. 
“Why, here lam!** 

She gazed at him steadily ; and a hard, incredu- 
lous, almost cunning glint came into her wide 
blue eyes. She took up the key carelessly, glanced 
at it; glanced at him. “It has made me — I mean 
the first shock, you know — it has made me a little 
faint.** She walked slowly, deliberately to the 


22 


The Return 


door, and unlocked it. “I’ll get a little sal 
volatile.” She softly drew out the key, and 
without once removing her eyes from his face, 
opened the door and pushed the key noiselessly 
in on the other side. “Please stay there; I won’t 
be a minute.” 

Lawford’s face smiled — a rather desperate, yet 
for all that a patient, resolute smile. “Oh yes, of 
course,” he said, almost to himself, “I had not 
foreseen, at least — ^you must do precisely what you 
please, Sheila. You were going to lock me in. 
You will, however, before taking any final step, 
please think over what it will entail. I did not 
think you would, after such proof, in this awful 
trouble — I did not think you would simply dis- 
believe me, Sheila. Who else is there to help me? 
You have the letter in your hand. Is n’t that 
sufficient proof? It was overwhelming proof to 
me. And even I doubted too; doubted myself. 
But never mind ; why I should have dreamed you 
would believe me, or taken this awful thing differ- 
ently, I don’t know. It ’s rather awful to have 
to go on alone. But there, think it over. I shall 
not stir until I hear the voices. And then, 
honestly, Sheila, I could n’t face quite that. I ’d 
sooner give up altogether. Any proof you can 
think of — I will — O God, I cannot bear it!” 
He covered his face with his hands; but in a 
moment looked up, unmoved once more. “Why, 
for that matter, ” he added slowly, and, as it were. 


The Dreaded Interview 


23 


with infinite pains, a faint thin smile again steal- 
ing into his face, “I think,” he turned wearily to 
the glass, “I think it ’s almost an improvement!” 

Something deep in those dark, clear eyes, out 
of that lean adventurous face, gleamed back at 
him, as it were, the distant flash of a heliograph, 
height to height, flashing Courage!” He shud- 
dered, and shut his eyes. “But I would really 
rather,” he added in a quiet, childlike way, “I 
would really rather, Sheila, you left me alone 
now.” 

His wife stood irresolute. “I understand you 
to explain,” she said, “that you went out of this 
house, just your usual self, this afternoon, for a 
walk; that for some reason, you went to Widder- 
stone — ‘ to read the tombstones, ^ that you had a 
heart attack, or, as you said at first, a fit, that 
you fell into a stupor, and came home like — like 
this. Am I likely to believe all that? Am I 
likely to believe such a story as that? Whoever 
you are, whoever you may be, is it likely? I am 
not in the least afraid. I thought at first it 
was some silly practical joke. I thought that at 
first. ” She paused, but no answer came. “Well, 
I suppose in a civilised country there is a remedy 
even for a joke as wicked as that. ” 

Lawford listened patiently. “She is pretend- 
ing; she is trying me; she is feeling her way,” he 
kept repeating to himself. “She knows I am I, 
but has n’t the courage. . . . Let her talk!” 


24 


The Return 


I shall leave the door open, ” Sheila continued, 
am not, as you no doubt very naturally as- 
sumed — I am not going to do anything either 
senseless or heedless. I am merely going to ask 
your brother Cecil to come in, if he is at home, and 
if not, no doubt otu* old friend Mr. Montgomery 
would — would help us.” Her scrutiny was still 
and concentrated, like that of a cat above a 
mouse’s hole. 

Lawford sat crouched together in the candle- 
light. “By all means, Sheila,” he said, slowly 
choosing his words, “if you think poor old Cecil, 
who next January will have been dead three years, 
will be of any use in our difficulty. Who Mr. 
Montgomery is — ” His voice dropped in utter 
weariness. “You did it very well, my dear,” he 
added softly. 

Sheila gently closed the door and sat down on 
the bed. He heard her softly crying, he heard 
the bed shaken with her sobs. But a slow glance 
towards the steady candle-flames restrained him. 
He let her cry on alone. When she had become 
a little more composed he stood up. “You have 
had no dinner,” he managed to blurt out at last, 
“you will be faint. It ’s useless to talk, even to 
think, any more to-night. Leave me to myself 
for a while. Don’t look at me any more. Per- 
haps I can sleep; perhaps if I sleep it will come 
right again. When the servants are gone up I 
will come down. Just let me have some — ■ 


The Dreaded Interview 


25 


some medical book, or other; and some more 
candles. Don’t think, Sheila; don’t even 
think!” 

Sheila paid him no attention for awhile. ^‘You 
tell me not to think,” she began, in a low, almost 
listless voice; “why — I wonder I am in my right 
mind. And ‘ eat ’ ! How can you have the heart- 
lessness to suggest it? You don’t seem in the 
least to realise what you say. You seem to have 
lost all — all consciousness. I quite agree, it is 
useless for me to burden you with my company 
while you are in your present condition of mind. 
But you will at least promise me that you won’t 
take any further steps in this awful business.” 
She could not, try as she would, bring herself again 
to look at him. She rose softly, paused a mo- 
ment with sidelong eyes, then turned deliberately 
towards the door. “What, what have I done to 
deserve all this?” 

And again that voice, so extraordinarily like, 
and yet in some vague fashion more arresting, 
more resonant than her husband’s, broke in- 
credibly out once more. “You will please leave 
the key, Sheila. I am ill, but I am not yet in the 
padded room. And please understand, I take no 
further steps in Hhis awful business’ until I hear 
a strange voice in the house. ” Sheila paused, but 
the quiet voice rang in her ear, desperately yet 
convincingly. She took the key out of the lock, 
placed it on the bed, and with a sigh, that was not 


26 


The Return 


quite without a hint of relief in its misery, she 
rustled downstairs. 

She speedily returned. have brought the 
book,” she said hastily. “I could only find the 
one volume. I have said you have taken a fresh 
chill. No one will disturb you. ” 

Lawford took the book without a word. And 
once more, with eyes stonily averted, his wife left 
him to his own company and that of the face in 
the glass. 

With fumbling fingers Lawford, when com- 
pletely deserted, opened Quain’s Dictionary of 
Medicine, He had never had much curiosity, 
and had always hated what he disbelieved, but 
none the less he had heard occasionally of absurd 
and questionable experiments. He remembered 
even to have glanced over reports of cases in 
the newspapers concerning disappearances, loss of 
memory, dual personality. Cranks. Oh yes, he 
thought now, with a sense of cold humiliating 
relief, there had been such cases as his before. 
They were no doubt curable. They must be 
comparatively common in America — that land of 
jangled nerves. Possibly bromide, rest, a bat- 
tery. But Quain, it seemed, shared his pre- 
judices, at least in this edition, or had hidden 
away all such apocryphal matter beneath technical 
terms, where no sensible man could find it. 
^‘Besides,” he muttered angrily, ‘‘what’s the 
good of your one volume?” He flung it down 


The Dreaded Interview 


27 


and strode to the bed, and rang the bell. Then 
suddenly recollecting himself, he paused and 
listened. There came a tap on the door. “Is 
that you, Sheila?” he called, doubtfully. 

“No, sir, it ’s me,” came the answer. 

“Oh, donh trouble; I only wanted to speak to 
your mistress. It ’s all right.” 

“Mistress has gone out, sir,” replied the voice. 

“Gone out?” 

“Yes, sir; she told me not to mention it; but I 
suppose as you asked ” 

“Oh, that’s all right; never mind; I didn’t 
ring. ” He stood with face uplifted, thinking. 

“Can I do anything, sir?” came the faint, 
nervous question after a long pause. 

“One moment, Ada, ” he called in a loud voice. 
He took out his pocket-book, sat down, and 
scribbled a little note. He hardly noticed how 
changed his handwriting was — all the clear round 
letters crabbed and irregular. 

“Are you there, Ada?” he called. “I am slip- 
ping the note beneath the door; just draw back 
the mat; that ’s it. Take it at once, please, to 
Mr. Critchett’s, and be sure to wait for an answer. 
Then come back direct to me, up here. I don’t 
think, Ada, your mistress believes much in 
Critchett ; but I have fully explained what I want. 
He has made me up many prescriptions. Explain 
that to his assistant if he is not there. Go at once, 
and you will be back before she is. I should be 


28 


The Return 


so very much obliged, tell him. *Mr. Arthur 
Lawford.^ ” 

The minutes slowly drifted by. He sat quite 
still, in the clear, untroubled light, waiting in the 
silence of the empty house. And for the first 
time he was confronted with the cold incredible 
horror of his ordeal. Who would believe, who 
could believe, that behind this strange and awful, 
yet how simple mask, lay himself? What test; 
what heaped-up evidence of identity would break 
it down? It was all a loathsome ignominy. It 
was utterly absurd. It was 

Suddenly, with a kind of apelike cunning, he 
deliberately raised a long lean forefinger and 
pointed it at the shadowy crystal of the looking- 
glass. Perhaps he was dead, was really and 
indeed changed in body, was fated really and 
indeed to change in soul, into That. ^Tt ^s that 
beastly voice again,” Lawford cried out loud, 
looking vacantly at his upstretched finger. And 
then, hand and arm, not too willingly, as it were, 
obeyed; relaxed and fell to his side. ‘‘You must 
keep a tight hold, old man,” he muttered to him- 
self. “Once, once you lose yourself the least 
symptom of that — the least symptom, and it *s 
all up!” And the fools, the heartless, prepos- 
terous fools had brought him one volume ! 

When on earth was Ada coming back? She 
was lagging on purpose. She was in the con- 
spiracy too. Oh, it should be a lesson to Sheila! 


The Dreaded Interview 


29 


Oh, if only daylight would come! ‘‘What are 
you going to do — to do — to do?” He rose once 
more and paced his silent cage. To and fro, 
thinking no more; just using his eyes, compelling 
them to wander from picture to picture, bedpost 
to bedpost ; now counting aloud his footsteps ; now 
humming; only, only to keep himself from think- 
ing. At last he took out a drawer and actually 
began arranging its medley of contents : ties, 
letters, studs, concert and theatre programmes — 
all higgledy-piggledy^ And in the midst of this 
childlike stratagem he heard a faint sound, as of 
heavy water trickling from a height* He turned. 
A thief was in one of the candles. It was gutter- 
ing out. He would be left in darkness. He 
turned hastily without a moment’s heed, to call 
for light, flung the door open, and full in the flare 
of a lamp, illuminating her pale forehead and 
astonished face beneath her black straw hat, 
stood face to face with Ada. 

With one swift dexterous movement he drew 
the door to after him, looking straight into her 
almost colourless steady eyes. “Ah,” he said 
instantly, in a high, faint voice, “the powder, 
thank you; yes, Mr. Lawford’s powder; thank 
you, thank you. He must be kept absolutely 
quiet — absolutely. Mrs. Lawford is following. 
Please tell her that I am here, when she returns. 
Mr. Critchett was in, then? Thank you. Extreme, 
extreme silence, please.” Again that knotted. 


30 


The Return 


melodramatic finger raised itself on high; and 
within that lean, cadaverous body the soul of its 
lodger quailed at this spectral boldness. But it 
was triumphant. The maid at once left him 
and went downstairs. He heard faint voices in 
muffled consultation. And in a moment Sheila’s 
silks rustled once more on the staircase. Lawford 
put down the lamp, and watched her deliberately 
close the door. 

^‘What does this mean?” she began swiftly, 
^‘I understand that — ^Ada tells me a stranger is 
here; giving orders, directions. Who is he? 
where is he? You bound yourself on your solemn 
promise not to stir till I returned. You . . . 
How can I, how can we get decently through this 
horrible business if you are so wretchedly indis- 
creet? You sent Ada to the chemist’s. What 
for? What for? Isay.” 

Lawford watched his wife with an almost ex- 
traneous interest. She was certainly extremely 
interesting from that point of view, that very 
novel point of view. 'Ht ’s quite useless,” he 
said, “to get in the least nervous or hysterical. 
I don’t care for the darkness just now. That 
was all. Tell the girl I am a strange doctor — 
Dr. Simon’s new partner — you are clever at con- 
ventionalities, Sheila. Invent! I said our patient 
must be kept quiet — I really think he must ; that 
is all, so far as Ada is concerned. . . . What on 
earth else are we to say?” he broke out. “That, 


The Dreaded Interview 


31 


for the present to everybody, is our only possible 
story. It will give us what we must have — 
time. And next — where is the second volume of 
Quain? I want that. And next — ^why have you 
broken faith with me?'' Mrs. Lawford sat 
down. This sudden and baffling outburst had 
stupefied her. 

“I can^t, I canT make head or tail of what you 
say. And for as having broken faith, as you call 
it, would any wife, would any sane woman, face 
what you have brought on us, a situation like this, 
without seeking advice and help? Mr. Bethany 
will be perfectly discreet — if he thinks discretion 
desirable. He is the only available friend we have 
close enough to ask at once. And things of this 
kind are, I suppose, if anybody's concern, his. 
It 's certain to leak out. Everybody will hear 
of it. Don’t flatter yourself you are going to 
hush up a thing like this for long. You can’t 
keep living skeletons in a cupboard. You think 
only of yourself, only of your own misfortune. 
But who ’s to know, pray, that you really are my 
husband — if you are? The sooner I get the 
vicar on my side the better for us both. Who in 
the whole of the parish — I ask you — and you 
must have the sense left to see that — who will 
believe that a respectable man, a gentleman, a 
Churchman, would deliberately go out to seek an 
afternoon’s amusement in a poky little country 
churchyard? Why, apart from everything else, 


32 


The Return 


that was absolutely mad to start with. Can you 
really wonder at the result?” Probably because 
she still steadfastly refused to look at him, her 
memory kept losing its hold on the appalling 
fact of his change. She only realised fully that 
she was in a great, unwarrantable, and insur- 
mountable difficulty, but until she actually lifted 
her eyes for a moment she had not fully realised 
what that difficulty was. She got up with a 
sudden and horrible nausea. ^‘One moment,” 
she said, “I will see if the servants have gone 
to bed.” 

That long, saturnine face, behind which Mr. 
Lawford lay in a dull and desperate ambush, 
smiled. Something partaking of its clay, some 
reflex ghost of its rather remarkable features, was 
even a little amused at Sheila. 

She returned in a moment, and stood in profile 
in the doorway. ‘‘Will you come down?” she 
remarked, distantly. 

“One moment, Sheila,” Mr. Lawford began 
miserably. “Before we take this irrevocable step, 
a step I implore you to postpone awhile — ^for what 
comes, I suppose, may go — what precisely have 
you told the vicar? I must in fairness know 
that. ” 

“ In fairness, ” she began ironically and suddenly 
broke off. Her husband had turned the flame of 
the lamp low down in the vacant room behind 
them; the corridor was lit but obscurely by the 


The Dreaded Interview 


33 


chandelier far down in the hall below. A faint, 
inexplicable dread fell softly and coldly on her 
heart. “Have you no trust in me?’’ she mur- 
mured a little bitterly. “I have simply told him 
the bare facts. ” 

They softly descended the stairs; she first, the 
dark figure following close behind her. 


CHAPTER III 


REVIEWING THE FACTS 

Mr. Bethany sat awaiting them in the dining- 
room, a large, heavily-furnished room with a great 
benign looking-glass on the mantelpiece, a marble 
clock, and rich old damask curtains. Fleecy silver 
hair was all that was visible of their visitor when 
they entered. But Mr. Bethany rose out of his 
chair when he heard them, and with a little jerk, 
turned sharply round. Thus it was that the 
gold-spectacled vicar and Lawford first confronted 
each other, the one brightly illuminated, the other 
framed in the gloom of the doorway. Mr. 
Bethany’s first scrutiny was timid and courteous, 
but beneath it he tried to be keen, and himself 
hastened round the table almost at a trot, to 
obtain, as delicately as possible, a closer view. 
But Lawford, having shut the door behind him, 
had gone straight to the fire and seated himself, 
leaning his face in his hands. Mr. Bethany 
smiled faintly, waved his hand almost as if in 
blessing, but certainly in peace, and tapped Mrs. 

34 


35 


Reviewing the Facts 

Lawford into the chair upon the other side. But 
he himself remained standing. 

“Mrs. Lawford has, I declare, been telling 
family secrets,” be began, and paused, peering. 
“But there, you will forgive an old friend’s intru- 
sion — this little confidence about a change, my 
dear fellow — about a ramble and a change?” He 
sat down, put up his kind little puckered face and 
peered again at Lawford, and then very hastily 
at his wife. But all her attention was centred 
on the bowed figure opposite to her. Lawford 
responded to this cautious advance without raising 
his head. 

“You do not wish me to repeat all that my wife 
tells me she has told you?” 

“Dear me, no,” said Mr. Bethany cheerfully, 
“I wish nothing, nothing, old friend. You must 
not burden yourself with me. If I may be of any 
help, here I am. . . . Oh, no, no, . . .” he 
paused, with blinking eyes, but wits still shrewd 
and alert. Why does n’t the man raise his head? 
he thought. A mere domestic dispute! 

“I thought,” he went on ruminatingly, “I 
thought on Tuesday, yes, on Tuesday, that you 
were n’t looking quite the thing. Indeed, I re- 
marked on it. But now, I understand from Mrs. 
Lawford that the malady has taken a graver turn 
— eh, Lawford, an heretical turn? I hear you 
have been wandering from the true fold.” Mr. 
Bethany leaned forward with what might be 


3 ^ 


The Return 


described as a very large smile, in a very small 
compass. ^‘And that, of course, entailed instant 
retribution.’' He broke off solemnly. ‘T know 
Widderstone churchyard well ; a most verdant and 
beautiful spot. The late rector, a Mr. Strickland, 
was a very old friend of mine. And his wife, dear 
good Alicia, used to set out her babies, in the 
morning, to sleep and to play there, twenty, dear 
me, perhaps twenty-five years ago. But I did 
not know, my dear Lawford, that you — ” and 
suddenly, without an instant’s warning, some- 
thing seemed to shout at him, ^‘Look, look! He 
is looking at you!” He stopped, faltered, and a 
slight warmth came into his face. “And — and 
you were taken ill there?” His voice had fallen 
quite fiat and faint. 

“ I fell asleep — or something of that sort, ” came 
the stubborn reply. 

“Yes,” said Mr. Bethany, brightly, “so your 
wife was saying. ‘Fell asleep,’ so have I too — 
scores of times”; he beamed, with beads of sweat 
glistening on his forehead. “And then — I ’m not, 
I ’m not persisting?” 

“Then I woke; refreshed, I think, as it seemed — 
I felt much better and came home.” 

“Ah, yes,” said his visitor. And after that 
there was a long, brightly lit, intense pause; at the 
end of which Lawford raised his face and again 
looked firmly at the kindly vicar. 

Mr. Bethany was a very shrunken old man; he 


37 


Reviewing the Facts 

sat perfectly still, his head craned a little forward, 
and his veined hands clutching his bent, spare 
knees. 

There was n’t the least sign of devilry, or out- 
facingness, or insolence in that lean, shadowy, 
steady head; and yet the vicar was compelled to 
sidle his glance away, so much the face shook him. 
He closed his eyes, too, as a cat does after ex- 
changing too direct a scrutiny with human eyes. 
He put out towards, and withdrew, a groping hand 
from Mrs. Lawford. 

“Is it,” came a voice from somewhere, “is it 
a great change, sir? I thought perhaps I may 
have exaggerated — candle-light, you know.” 

Mr. Bethany remained still and silent, striving 
to entertain one thought at a time. His lips 
moved as if he were talking to himself. And 
again it was Lawford’s faltering voice that broke 
the silence. “You see,” he said, “I have never 
... no fit, or anything of that kind before. I 
remember on Tuesday ... oh yes, quite well. I 
did feel seedy, very. And we talked, did n’t we? 
— Harvest Festival. Mrs. Winn’s flowers, the 
new offertory-bags, and all that. For God’s sake. 
Vicar, it is not as bad as — as they make out?” 

Mr. Bethany woke with a start. He leaned 
forward, and stretched out a long, black wrinkled 
sleeve, just managing to reach far enough to tap 
Lawford’s knee. “Don’t worry, don’t worry,” 
he said soothingly. “We believe, we believe.” 


38 


The Return 


It was, none the less, a sheer act of faith. He 
took off his spectacles and took out his handker- 
chief. ‘‘What we must do, eh, my dear,” he 
half turned to Mrs. Lawford, “what we must do 
is to consult, yes, consult together. And later — 
we must have advice — medical advice ; unless, as 
I very much suspect, it is merely a little quiet 
temporary physical aberration. Science, I am 
told, is making great strides, experimenting, grop- 
ing after things which no sane man has ever 
dreamed of before — ^without being burned alive 
for it. What 's in a name? Nerves, especially, 
Lawford. ” 

Mrs. Lawford sat perfectly still, absorbedly 
listening, turning her face first this way, then that, 
to each speaker in turn. “That is what I thought, ” 
she said, and cast one fleeting glance across at the 
fireplace, “but ” 

The little old gentleman turned sharply with 
half -blind eyes, and lips tight shut. “I think,” 
he said, with a kind of austere humour, “I think, 
do you know, I see no ‘but.’ ” He paused as if 
to catch the echo, and added, “It’s our only 
course. ’ ’ He continued to polish round and round 
his glasses. Mrs. Lawford rather magnificently 
rose. 

“Perhaps if I were to leave you together awhile : 
I shall not be far off. It is,” she explained, as it 
were into a huge vacuum, “it is a terrible visita- 
tion.” She moved gravely round the table and 


Reviewing the Facts 39 

very softly and firmly closed the door after 
her. 

Lawford took a deep breath. ^‘Of course/’ he 
said, ^^you realise my wife does not believe me. 
She thinks, ” he explained naively, as if to himself, 
^*she thinks I am an impostor. Goodness knows 
what she does think. I can’t think much myself 
— for long!” 

The vicar rubbed busily on. ‘‘I have found, 
Lawford,” he said smoothly, ^‘that in all real 
difficulties the only feasible plan is — is to face the 
main issue. The others right themselves. Now, 
to take a plunge into your generosity, Lawford. 
May I hear, for you’ve let me in far enough to 
make it impossible for me to get out — exactly the 
whole story? All that I know now, so far as I 
could gather from your wife, poor soul, is, of course, 
inconceivable; that you went out one man and 
came home another. You will understand, my 
dear man, I am speaking, as it were, by rote. God 
has mercifully ordered that the human brain works 
slowly ; first the blow, hours afterwards the bruise. 
Oh, dear me, that man Hume — ‘on miracles’ — 
positively amazing! So that too, please, you will 
be quite clear about ; Credo — not — quia impossihile 
est, but because you, Lawford, have told me. 
Now then, if it won’t be too wearisome to you, the 
whole story.” He sat, lean and erect in his big 
chair, a hand resting loosely on each knee, 
in one spectacles, in the other a dangling 


40 


The Return 


pocket handkerchief. And the dark, sallow, 
aquiline, formidable figure, with its oddly chang- 
ing voice, retold the whole story from the 
beginning. 

“You were aware, then, of nothing different, I 
understand, until you actually looked into the 
glass?” 

“Only vaguely. I mean that after waking 
I felt much better, more alert. And my 
thoughts ” 

“Ah, yes, your thoughts?” 

“I hardly know — oh, clear, as if I had had a 
real long rest. It was just like being a boy again. 
Influenza dispirits one so.” 

Mr. Bethany gazed without stirring. “And 
yet, you know,” he said, “I can hardly believe, I 
mean conceive, how — You have been taking no 
drugs, no quackery, Lawford?” 

“I never dose myself,” said Lawford, with 
sombre pride. 

“God bless me, that ’s Lawford to the echo,” 
thought his visitor. “And before — ” he went on 
gently; “you see, I really cannot conceive how a 
mere fit could . . . before you sat down you were 
quite alone?” He stuck out his head. “There 
was nobody with you?” 

“With me? Oh no,” came the soft answer. 

“What had you been thinking of? In these 
days of faith-cures, and hypnotism, and telepathy, 
and subliminalities — ^why, the simple old world 


41 


Reviewing the Facts 

grows very confusing; but rarely, very rarely 
novel. You were thinking, you say; do you 
remember, perhaps, just the drift?’* 

‘‘Well,” began Lawford ruminatingly, “there 
was something curious even then, perhaps. I 
remember, for instance, I knelt down to read an 
old tombstone. There was a little seat — no back. 
And an epitaph. The sun was just setting; some 
French name. And there was a long jagged crack 
in the stone, like the black line you know one sees 
after lightning, I mean it ’s as clear as that 
even now, in memory. Oh, yes, I remember. 
And then, I suppose, came the sleep — stupid, 
sluggish: and then; well, here I am!” 

“You are absolutely certain, then,” persisted 
Mr. Bethany almost querulously, “there was no 
living creature near you. Bless me, Lawford, I 
see no unkindness in believing what the Bible 
itself relates. There are powers supernatural. 
Saul, and so on. We are all convinced of that. 
No one?” 

“I remember distinctly,” replied Lawford, in a 
calm, stubborn voice, “I looked up all around me, 
while I was kneeling there, and there was n’t a soul 
to be seen. Because, you see, it even then occurred 
to me that it would have looked rather queer — my 
wandering about like that, I mean. Facing me 
there were some cypress-trees, and beyond, a low 
sunken fence, and then, just open country. Up 
above there were the gravestones toppling down 


42 


The Return 


hill, where I had just strolled down, and sunshine ! 
He suddenly threw up his hand. “Oh, marvel- 
lous! streaming in gold, flaming, like God’s own 
ante-chamber. ” 

There was a very pregnant pause. Mr. Bethany 
shrunk back a little into his chair. His lips 
moved; he folded his spectacles. 

“Yes, yes,” he said. And then very quietly 
he stole one mole-like look into his sidesman’s 
face. 

“What is Dr. Simon’s number?” he said. 
Lawford was gazing gloomily into the fire. “Oh, 
Annandale, ” he replied absently. “I don’t know 
the number.” 

“Do you believe in him? Your wife mentioned 
him. Is he clever?” 

“Oh, he’s new,” said Lawford; “old James 
was our doctor. He — he killed my father.” He 
laughed out shamefacedly. 

“A sound, lovable man,” said Mr. Bethany, 
“one of the kindest men I ever knew; and a very 
old friend of mine. ” 

And suddenly the dark face turned with a 
shudder from the fire, and spoke in a low, trem- 
bling voice. “Only one thing — only one thing — 
my sanity, my sanity. If once I forget, who will 
believe me?” He thrust his long, lean fingers 
beneath his coat. “And mad,” he added; “I 
would sooner die.” 

Mr. Bethany deliberately adjusted his spec- 


43 


Reviewing the Facts 

tacles. ^‘May I, may I experiment?’^ he said 
boldly. There came a tap on the door. 

“Bless me, ” said the vicar, taking out his watch, 
“it is a quarter to twelve. Yes, yes, Mrs. Law- 
ford,” he trotted round to the door. “We are 
beginning to see light — a ray!” 

“But I — I can see in the dark,” whispered 
Lawford, as if at a cue, turning with an inscrutable 
smile to the fire. 

The vicar came in again, wrapped up in a little 
tight grey great-coat, and a white silk muffler. 
He looked up unflinchingly into Lawford’s face, 
and tears stood in his eyes. “Patience, patience, 
my dear fellow, ” he repeated gravely, squeezing his 
hand. “And rest, complete rest, is imperative. 
Just till the first thing to-morrow. And till then, ” 
he turned to Mrs. Lawford, where she stood look- 
ing in at the doorway, “oh, yes, complete quiet; 
and caution!” 

Mrs. Lawford let him out. He shook his head 
once or twice, holding her fingers. “Oh, yes,” he 
whispered, “it is your husband, not the smallest 
doubt. I tried : for myself. But something — 
something has happened. Don’t fret him now. 
Have patience. Oh, yes, it is incredible . . . the 
change! But there, the very first thing to-mor- 
row. ” She closed the door gently after him, and 
stepping softly back to the dining-room, peered 
in. Her husband’s back was turned, but he 
could see her in the looking-glass, stooping a 


44 


The Return 


little, with set face watching him, in the silvery 
stillness. 

“Well,"’ he said, '‘is the old — he doggedly 
met the fixed eyes facing him there, "is our old 
friend gone?” 

"Yes,” said Sheila, "he's gone.” Lawford 
sighed and turned round. "It 's useless talking 
now, Sheila. No more questions. I cannot tell 
you how tired I am; and my head.” 

"What is wrong with your head?” inquired his 
wife discreetly. 

The haggard face turned gravely and patiently. 
"Only one of my old headaches,” he smiled, "my 
old bilious headaches — the hereditary Lawford 
variety.” But his voice fell low again. "We 
must get to bed.” 

With a rather pretty and childish movement, 
Sheila gently drew her hands across her silk skirts. 
"Yes, dear,” she said, "I have made up a bed for 
you in the large spare room. It is thoroughly 
aired.” She came softly in, and hastened over 
to a closed work-table that stood under the curtains 
and opened it. 

Lawford watched her, utterly expressionless, 
utterly motionless. He opened his mouth and 
shut it again, still watching his wife stooping with 
ridiculously too busy fingers, searching through 
her coloured silks. 

Again he opened his mouth. "Yes,” he said, 
and stalked slowly towards the door. But there 


45 


Reviewing the Facts 

he paused. ‘‘ God knows,” he said, strangely and 
meekly, ‘‘I am sorry, sorry for all this. You 
will forgive me, Sheila?” 

She looked up swiftly. ^‘It’s very tiresome, 
I can’t find anywhere,” she murmured, “I can’t 
find anywhere the — the red-box key.” 

Lawford’s cheek turned more sallow than ever. 
“You are only pretending to look for it,” he said, 
“to try me. We both know perfectly well the 
lock is broken. Ada broke it. ’ ’ 

Sheila let fall the lid. “I am so very glad the 
vicar was at home,” she said brightly. “And 
mind, mind you rest, Arthur. There ’s nothing 
so bad but it might be worse. Oh, I can’t, I 
can’t bear it!” She sat down in a chair and 
huddled her face between her hands, sobbing on 
and on, without a tear. 

Lawford listened and stared solemnly on. 
“Whatever it may be, Sheila, I will be loyal,” 
he said. 

Her sobs hushed, and again cold horror crept 
over her. Nobody in the whole world could have 
said that “ I will be loyal ” quite like that — nobody 
but Arthur. She stood up, patting her hair. “I 
don’t think my brain would bear much more. 
It ’s useless to talk, Arthur. If you will go up ; 
I will put out the lamp.” 


CHAPTER IV 


ISOLATED 

One solitary and tall candle burned on the great 
dressing-table. Faint, solitary pictures broke the 
blankness of each wall. The carpet was rich, 
the bed impressive, and the basins on the wash- 
stand as uninviting as the bed. Lawford sat 
down on the edge of the bed in complete isolation. 
He sat without stirring, listening to his watch 
ticking in his pocket. The china clock on the 
chimney-piece pointed cheerfully to the hour of 
dawn. It was exactly, he computed carefully, five 
hours and seven minutes fast. Not the slightest 
sound broke the stillness, until he heard, very, very 
softly and gradually, the key of his door turn in 
the oiled wards, and realised that he was a prisoner. 
Women were strange creatures. How often he 
had heard it said ! he thought lamely. He felt no 
anger, no surprise nor resentment, at the trick. It 
was only to be expected. He could sit on till 
morning ; easily till morning. He had never noticed 
before how empty a well-furnished room could 
seem. It was his own room too ; his best visitor’s 
46 


Isolated 


47 


room. His father-in-law had slept here, with his 
whiskers on that pillow. His wife’s most for- 
midable aunt had been all night here, alone with 
these pictures. She certainly was — “But what 
are you doing here ? ” cried a voice suddenly out 
of his reverie. 

He started up and stretched himself, and, tak- 
ing out the neat little packet that the maid had 
brought from the chemist’s, he drew up a chair, 
and sat down once more in front of the glass. He 
sighed vacantly, rose and took down from the 
wall above the fireplace a tinted photograph of 
himself that Sheila had had enlarged about twelve 
years ago. It was a brighter, younger, hairier, 
but unmistakably the same dull, indolent Lawford 
who had ventured into Widderstone churchyard 
that afternoon. The cheek was a little plumper, 
the eyes not quite so full-lidded, the hair a little 
more precisely parted, the upper lip graced with 
a small blond moustache. He tilted the portrait 
into the candlelight, and compared it with this 
reflection in the glass of what had come out of 
Widderstone, feature with feature, with perfect 
composure and extreme care. Then he laid the 
ugly frame down on the table, and gazed quietly at 
the tiny packet. It was to be a day of queer ex- 
periences. He had never realised before with how 
many miracles mere everyday life is besieged. 
Here in this small, punctilious packet lay a Sesame, 
a transformation, beside which the transformation 


48 


The Return 


of that rather flaccid face of the noonday into 
this tense, sinister face of midnight was but as a 
moving from house to house — a change just as 
irrevocable and complete, and yet so very normal. 
Which should it be, that — his face lifted itself 
once more to the icelike gloom of the looking- 
glass — that, or this? 

It simply gazed back with a kind of quizzical 
pity on its lean features under the scrutiny of eyes 
so deep, so meaningful, so desolate, and yet so 
indomitably courageous. In the brain behind 
them a slow and stolid argument was in progress ; 
the one baffling reply on the one side to every 
appeal on the other being still simply, ^^What 
dreams may come ? ” 

Those eyes surely knew something of dreams, 
else, why this violent and stubborn endeavour to 
keep awake? Lawford did indeed once actually 
frame the question, “But who the devil are you? 
And it really seemed the eyes perceptibly widened 
or brightened. The mere vexation of his unpar- 
alleled position, Sheila's pathetic incredulity, his 
old vicar’s laborious kindness, the tiresome net- 
work of experience into which he would be dragged, 
struggling, on the morrow, and on the morrow 
after that, and after that — the thought of all these 
things faded for the moment from his mind, lost, 
if not their significance, at least their instancy. 
He simply sat face to face with the sheer difficulty 
of living on at all. He even concluded in a kind of 


Isolated 


49 


lethargy that had nothing occurred, no ''change,’' 
he might still be sitting here, Arthur Bennet Law- 
ford, in his best visitor’s room, deciding between 
inscrutable life and just — death. He supposed 
he was tired out. His thoughts had n ’t even the 
energy to complete themselves. None cared but 
himself and this — this Silence. 

"But what does it all mean? ” the insistent voice 
he was getting to know so well began tediously 
inquiring again. And every time he raised his 
eyes, or, rather, as in many cases it seemed, his 
eyes raised themselves, they saw this haunting 
face there — a face he no longer bitterly rebelled 
at, nor dimmed with scrutiny, but a face that was 
becoming a kind of hold on life, even a kind of 
refuge, an ally. It was a face that might have 
come out of a rather flashy book : such as is revered 
on the stage. "A rotten bad face,” he whispered 
at it in his own familiar slang, after some such 
abrupt encounter; a fearless, packed, daring, 
fascinating face, with even — what? — a spice of 
genius in it. Whose the devil’s face was it? 
What on earth was the matter! "Brazen it out,” 
a jubilant thought cried suddenly; "follow it up; 
play the game! give me just one opening. Think 
— think what I’ve risked! ” 

And all these voices, thought Lawford, in 
deadly lassitude, meant only one thing — insanity. 
A blazing, impotent indignation seized him. 
He leaned near, peering as it were out of a red. 




4 


50 


The Return 


dusky mist. He snatched up the china candle- 
stick, and poised it above the sardonic reflection, as 
if to throw. Then slowly, with infinite pains, he 
drew back from the glass and replaced the candle- 
stick on the table, stuffed his paper packet into 
his pocket, took off his boots, and threw himself 
on to the bed. In a little while, in the faint, still 
light, he opened drowsily wandering eyes. ^^Poor 
old thing!’' his voice murmured. ^*Poor old 
Sheila!” 


CHAPTER V 


THE MORNING AFTER 

It was but a little after daybreak when Mrs. 
Lawford, after listening at his door awhile, turned 
the key and looked in on her husband. Blue-grey 
light from between the Venetian blinds just dusked 
the room. She stood in a bluish dressing-gown, 
her hand on her bosom, looking down on the lean, 
impassive face. For the briefest instant her heart 
had leapt with an indescribable surmise; to fall 
dull as lead once more. Breathing equably and 
quietly, the strange figure lay stretched upon 
the bed. *‘How can he sleep? How can he 
sleep?’* she whispered with a black and hope- 
less indignation. What a night she had had! 
And he I 

She turned noiselessly away. The candle had 
guttered to extinction. The big glass reflected 
her, voluminous and wan, her dark-ringed eyes, 
full lips, rich, glossy hair, and rounded chin. 
^ ‘ Yes, yes, ’ ’ it seemed to murmur mournfully. She 
turned away, and drawing stealthily near stooped 
once more quite low, and examined the face on 
51 


52 


The Return 


the pillow with lynx-like concentration. And 
though every nerve revolted at the thought, she 
was finally convinced, unwillingly even, but as- 
suredly, that her husband was here. He seemed 
to haunt, like a ghostly emanation, this strange, 
detestable face — as memory supplies the features 
concealed beneath a mask. The face was still 
and stony, like one dead or imaged in wax, yet 
beneath it dreams were passing — silly, ordinary 
Lawford dreams. She was almost alarmed at 
the terribly rancorous hatred she felt for the face. 
. . . *Tt was just like Arthur to be so taken in!’' 

Then she, too, remembered Quain, and remem- 
bered also in the slowly paling dusk that the house 
would soon be stirring. She went out and noise- 
lessly locked the door again. But it was useless 
to begin looking for Quain now — ^her husband had 
a good many dull books, most of them his ‘‘ec- 
centric” father’s. What must the servants be 
thinking? And what was all that talk about a 
mysterious visitor? She would have to question 
Ada — diplomatically. She returned to her room 
and sat down in an arm-chair, and waited. In 
sheer weariness she fell into a doze, and woke at 
the sound of dustpan and broom. She rang the 
bell, and asked for hot water, tea, and a basin of 
cornflour. 

‘‘And please, Ada, be as quiet as possible over 
your work; your master is in a nice sleep, 
and must not be disturbed on any account. In 


53 


The Morning After 

the front bedroom.” She looked up suddenly. 
” By the way, who let Dr. Ferguson in last night? ” 
It was dangerous, but successful. 

“Dr. Ferguson, m’m? Oh, you mean . . . 
He was in.” 

Sheila smiled resignedly. “Was in? What 
do you mean, ^was in’? And where were you, 
then?” 

“I had been sent out to Critchett’s, the 
chemist’s.” 

“Of course, of course. So cook let Dr. Fergu- 
son in then? Why did n’t you say so before, Ada? 
And did you bring the medicine with you?” 

“ It was in an envelope, m’m. But cook is sure 
she heard no knock — not while I was out. So Dr. 
Ferguson must have come in quite unbeknown.” 

“Well, really,” said Sheila, “it seems very diffi- 
cult to get at the truth sometimes. And when 
illness is in the house I cannot understand why 
there should be no one available to answer the 
door. You must have left it ajar, unsecured, 
when you went out. And pray, what if Dr. Fergu- 
son had been some common tramp? That would 
have been a nice thing!” 

“ I am quite certain, m’m, that I did shut 
the door. And cook says she never so much as 
stirred from the kitchen till I came down the area 
steps with the packet. And that’s all I know 
about it, m’m; except that he was here when I 
came back. I did not know even there was a 


54 


The Return 


Dr. Ferguson; and my mother ’s lived here nine- 
teen years." 

“We must be thankful your mother enjoys 
such good health," replied Mrs. Lawford suavely. 
“Please tell cook to be very careful with the corn- 
flour — to be sure it ’s well mixed and thoroughly 
done." 

Mrs. Lawford’s eyes followed with a certain 
discomfort those narrow print shoulders descend- 
ing the stairs. And this abominable ruse was — 
Arthur^s! She ran up lightly and listened with 
her ear to the panel of his door. And just as she 
was about to turn away again, there came a little 
light knock at the front door. 

Mrs. Lawford paused at the loop of the stair- 
case; and not altogether with gratitude or relief 
she heard the voice of Mr. Bethany, inquiring 
in cautious but quite audible tones after her 
husband. 

She dressed quickly and went down. The little, 
white old man looked very solitary in the long, 
flreless drawing-room. 

“I could not sleep," he said; “I don’t think I 
grasped in the least, I don’t indeed, until nearly 
home, the complexity of our problem. I came, in 
fact, to a lamp-post — casting a peculiar shadow, 
and then — you know how such thoughts seize us, 
my dear — like a sudden inspiration, I realised how 
tenuous, how appallingly tenuous a hold we have^ 
we all have on personality. “ But that," he con- 


55 


The Morning After 

tinued rapidly, “ that’s only for ourselves — and 
after the event. Ours, just now, is to act. And 
first ?” 

'‘You really do, then — ^you really are con- 
vinced — ” began Mrs. Lawford. 

But Mr. Bethany was too quick. "We must 
be most circumspect. My dear friend, we must 
be most circumspect, for all our sakes. And this, 
you ’ll say,” he added, smiling, stretching out his 
arms, his soft hat in one hand, his umbrella in 
the other, "this is being circumspect — a seven 
o’clock in the morning call ! But you see, my dear, 
I have come, as I took the precaution of explaining 
to the maid, because it ’s now or never to-day. It 
does so happen that I have to take a wedding for 
an old friend ’s niece at Witchett ; so when in 
need, you see. Providence enables us to tell even 
the conventional truth. Now really, how is he? 
has he slept? has he recalled himself at all? is 
there any change? and, dear me, how are you ? ” 

Mrs. Lawford sighed. "A broken night is 
really very little to a mother,” she said. "He is 
still asleep. He has n’t, I think, stirred all night.” 

"Not stirred! ” Mr. Bethany repeated. "You 
baffle me. And you have watched?” 

"Oh, no,” was the cheerful answer; " I felt that 
quiet, solitude, space, were everything ; he preferred 
it so. He — he changed alone, I suppose. Don’t 
you think it almost stands to reason that he will 
be alone . . . when he comes back? Was n’t I 


56 


The Return 


right? But there, it’s useless, it’s worse than 
useless, to talk like this. My husband is gone. 
Some terrible thing has happened. Whatever 
the mystery may be, he will never come back 
alive. My only fear is that I am dragging you into 
a matter that should from the beginning have 
been entrusted to — Oh, it’s monstrous!” It 
seemed for a moment as if she were blinking to 
keep back her tears, yet her scrutiny seemed merely 
to harden. 

Only the merest flicker of the folded eyelids 
over the greenish eyes of her visitor answered the 
challenge. He stood small and black, peeping 
fixedly out of the window at the sunflecked laurels. 

^‘Last night,” he said slowly, when I said good- 
bye to your husband, on the tip of my tongue 
were the words I have used, in season and out of 
season, for nearly forty -five years — ‘ God knows 
best.’ Well, my dear lady, a sense of humour, 
a sense of reverence, or perhaps even a taint of 
scepticism — call it what you will — ^just inter- 
rupted them. Oh, no, not any of these, my child ; 
just pity, overwhelming pity. God does know 
best; but in a matter like this it is not even my 
place to say so; it would be good for none of us 
to endanger our souls even with verbal cant. N ow, 
if, do you think, I had just five minutes’ talk — 
five minutes; would it disquiet him?” 

Only by an almost undignified haste, for the 
vicar was remarkably agile, Sheila managed to 


57 


The Morning After 

unlock the bedroom door without, apparently, 
his perceiving it, and with a warning finger she 
preceded him into the great bedroom. 

“Oh, yes, yes,*^ he was whispering to himself; 
“alone — well, well!’^ He hung his hat on his 
umbrella and leaned it in a comer, and then he 
turned. 

“I don’t think, you know, an old friend does him 
any wrong; but last night I had no real oppor — ” 
He firmly adjusted his spectacles, and looked 
long into the dark, dispassioned face. 

“H’m!” he said, and fidgeted, and peered again. 
Mrs. Lawford watched him keenly. 

“ Do you still — ” she began. 

But at the same moment he too broke silence, 
suddenly stepping back with the innocent remark, 
“Has he — has he asked for anything?” 

“Only for Quain.” 

“Quain?” 

“The Medical Dictionary.” 

“Oh, yes; bless me; of course. ... A calm, 
complete sleep of utter prostration — utter nervous 
prostration. And can one wonder? Poor fellow, 
poor fellow ! ’ ’ He walked to the window and peered 
between the blinds. “Sparrows, sunshine — yes, 
and here’s the postman,” he said, as if to him- 
self. Then he turned sharply round, with mind 
made up. 

“Now, do you leave me here,” he said. “Take 
half an hour’s quiet rest. He will be glad of a 


58 


The Return 


dull old fellow like me when he wakes. And 
as for my pretty bride, if I miss the train, she 
must wait till the next — good discipline, my dear. 
Oh, dear me ! I don’t change. What a precious 
experience, now, this would have been for a tot- 
tery, talkative, owlish old parochial creature 
like me! But there, there! Light words make 
heavy hearts, I see. I shall be quite comfort- 
able. No, no, I breakfasted at home. There ’s 
hat and iimbrella; at 9.3 I can fly.” 

Mrs. Lawford thanked him mutely. He smil- 
ingly but firmly bowed her out and closed the 
door. 

But eyes and brain had been very busy. He 
had looked at the gutted candle; at the tinted 
bland portrait on the dressing-table; at the chair 
drawn up ; at the boots ; and now again he turned 
almost with a groan to the sleeper. Then he 
took out an envelope, on which he had jotted 
various memoranda, and waited awhile. Minutes 
passed and at last the sleeper faintly stirred, 
muttering. 

Mr. Bethany stooped quickly. ^^What is it, 
what is it?” he whispered. 

Lawford sighed. ‘ ‘ I was only dreaming, Sheila, ’ ’ 
he said, and softly, peacefully opened his eyes. 

I dreamed I was in the — ” His lids narrowed, 
his dark eyes fixed themselves on the anxious 
spectacled face bending over him. ‘ ‘ Mr. Bethany ! 
Where ! What ’ s wrong ? ’ ’ 


59 


The Morning After 

His friend put out his hand. “There, there,’* 
he said soothingly, “do not be disturbed; do not 
disquiet yourself!” 

Lawford struggled up. Slowly, painfully, con- 
sciousness returned to him. He glanced furtively 
round the room, at his clothes, slinkingly at the 
vicar; licked his lips; flushed with extraordinary 
rapidity; and suddenly burst into tears. 

Mr. Bethany sat without movement, waiting 
till he should have spent himself. “ Now, Law- 
ford,” he said gently, “compose yourself, old 
friend; we must face the music — like men.” He 
went to the window, drew up the blind, peeped 
out, and took off his spectacles. 

“The first thing to be done,” he said, return- 
ing briskly to his chair, “is to send for Simon. 
Now, does Simon know you well?'' Lawford 
shook his head. “Would he recognise you? . . . 
I mean . . .” 

“ I have only met him once — ^in the evening.” 

“Good; let him come immediately, then. Tell 
him just the facts. If I am not mistaken, he will 
pooh-pooh the whole thing ; tell you to keep quiet, 
not to worry, and so on. My dear fellow, if we 
realised, say, typhoid, who ’d dare to face it? 
That will give us time ; to wait awhile, to recover 
our breath, to see what happens next. And if — 
as I don’t believe for a moment. — Why, in 
that case I heard the other day of a most excel- 
lent man — Grosser, of Wimpole Street; nerves. 


6o 


The Return 


He would be absorbed. He’d bottle you in 
spirit, Lawford. We ’ll have him down quietly. 
You see? But there won’t be any necessity. 
Oh, no. By then light will have come. We shall 
remember. What I mean is this.” He crossed 
his legs and pushed out his lips. We are on 
quaky ground; and it’s absolutely essential that 
you keep cool, and trust. I am yours, heart 
and soul — ^you know that. I own frankly, at 
first I was shaken. And I have, I confess, been 
very cunning. But first, faith, then evidence 
to bolster it up. The faith was absolute” — 
he placed one firm hand on Lawford’s knee — 
“ why, I cannot explain; but it was; the evidence 
is convincing. But there are others to think of. 
The shock, the incredibleness, the consequences; 
we must not scan too closely. Think with ; never 
against! and bang go all the arguments! Your 
wife, poor dear, believes ; but, of course, of course, 
she is horribly — ” he broke off; ‘‘of course, she is 
shaken j you old simpleton! Time will heal all 
that. Time will wear out the mask. Time will 
tire out this detestable physical witchcraft. The 
mind, the self ’s the thing. That must — old 
fogey that I am for saying it — that must be kept 
unsmirched. We won’t go wearily over the 
painful subject again. You told me last night, 
dear old friend, that you were absolutely alone 
at Widderstone. That is enough. But here 
we have visible facts, tangible effects, and there 


The Morning After 6i 

must have been a definite reason and a cause 
for them. I believe in the devil, in the Powers 
of Darkness, Lawford, as firmly as I believe he 
and they are powerless — in the long run. They 
— what shall we say? — have surrendered their 
intrinsicality. And you and I with God’s help 
will just tire them out. And that ally gone, 
our poor dear old Mrs. Grundy will at once 
capitulate. Eh? Eh?” 

Through all this long and somewhat arduous 
harangue, consciousness, like the gradual light 
of the dawn, had been flooding that other brain; 
and the face that now confronted Mr. Bethany, 
though with his feeble, unaided sight he could 
only very obscurely discern it, was vigilant and 
keen, in every sharp-cut, hungry feature. 

A rather prolonged silence followed, the visitor 
peering mutely. The black eyes nearly closed, 
the face turned slowly towards the window, saw 
bumt-out candle, comprehensive glass. 

Yes, yes,” he said; ’ll send for Simon at 
once.” 

‘‘Good,” said Mr. Bethany, and more doubt- 
fully repeated “good.” “Now there’s only one 
thing left,” he went on cheerfully. “I have 
jotted down a few test questions here; they are 
questions no one on this earth could answer 
but you, Lawford; just — just for external proofs. 
You won’t, you can’t, mistake my motive. We 
cannot foretell or foresee what need may arise 


62 


The Return 


for just such jogtrot primitive evidence. I pro- 
pose that you now answer them here, in writing. 

Mr. Lawford stood up and walked to the look- 
ing-glass, and paused. He put his hand to his 
head. “Yes, ” he said, “of course; it ’s a rattling 
good move. I ’m not quite awake; myself, I 
mean. I’ll do it, now.” He took out a pencil 
case and tore another leaf from his pocket-book. 
“What are they?” 

Mr. Bethany rang the bell. Sheila herself 
answered it. She stood on the threshold and 
looked across through a shaft of autumnal stm- 
shine at her husband, and her husband with a 
quiet, strange smile looked across through the 
sunshine at his wife. Mr. Bethany waited in vain. 

“I am just going to put the arch-impostor 
through his credentials,” he said tartly. “Now 
then, Lawford!” He read out the questions, 
one by one, from his crafty little list, pursing 
his hps between each; and one by one, Lawford, 
seated at the dressing-table, fluently scribbled 
his answers. Then question and answer were 
rigorously compared by Mr. Bethany, with small 
white head bent close and spectacles poised upon 
the powerful nose, and signed and dated, and 
passed to Mrs. Lawford without a word. 

Mrs. Lawford read question and answer where 
she stood, in complete silence. She looked up. 
“Many of these questions I don’t know the 
answers to myself,” she said. 


63 


The Morning After 

^Tt is immaterial,” said Mr. Bethany. 

“One answer is — is inaccurate.” 

“Yes, yes, quite so: due to a mistake in a letter 
from myself.” 

Mrs. Lawford read quietly on, folded the papers, 
and held them out between finger and thumb. 
“The — ^handwriting ...” she remarked very 
softly. 

“Wonderful, isn’t it?” said Mr. Bethany 
warmly; “all the general look and run of the 
thing different, but every real essential feature 
unchanged. Now into the envelope. And now a 
little wax?” 

Mrs. Lawford stood waiting. “There ’s a green 
piece of sealing-wax, ” almost drawled the quiet 
voice, “in the top right drawer of the nest in the 
study, which old James gave me the Christmas 
before last. ” He glanced with lowered eyelids at 
his wife’s flushed cheek. Their eyes met. 

“Thank you,” she said. 

When she returned the vicar was sitting in 
a chair, leaning his chin on the knobbed handle 
of his umbrella. He rose and lit a taper for her 
with a match from a little green pot on the table ; 
and Mrs. Lawford, with trembling fingers, sealed 
the letter, as he directed, with his own seal. 

“There!” he said triumphantly, “how many 
more such brilliant lawyers, I wonder, lie dor- 
mant in the Church? And who shall keep this? 
. . . Why, all three, of course.” He went on 


64 


The Return 


without pausing, Some little drawer now, secret 
and imdetectable, with a lock.” Just such a 
little drawer that locked itself with a spring lay- 
by chance in the looking-glass. There the letter 
was hidden. Then Mr. Bethany looked at his 
watch. ^‘Nineteen minutes,” he said. ^‘The 
next thing, my dear child — we ’re getting on 
swimmingly; and it’s astonishing how things 
are simplified by mere use — the next thing is to 
send for Simon. ” 

Sheila took a deep breath, but did not look up. 
am entirely in your hands,” she replied. 

^‘So be it,” said he crisply. “Get to bed, 
Lawford ; it ’s better so. And I ’ll look in on 
my way back fro^n Witchett. I came, my dear 
fellow, in such gloomy disturbance of mind; it 
was getting up too early; it fogs old brains. 
Good-bye, good-bye.” 

He squeezed his hand. Then, with umbrella 
under his arm, his hat on his head, the spectacles 
readjusted, he hurried out of the room. Mrs. Law- 
ford followed him. For a few minutes Lawford 
sat motionless with head bent a little, and eyes 
restlessly scanning the floor. Then he rose ab- 
ruptly, and in a quarter of an hour was in bed, 
alone with his slow thoughts, while a basin of 
cornflour stood untasted on a little table at his 
bedside, and a cheerful fire burned in the best 
visitor’s room’s tiny grate. 

At half-past eleven Dr. Simon entered this 


65 


The Morning After 

soundless seclusion. He sat down beside Lawford, 
and took temperature and pulse. Then he half 
closed his lids, and scanned his patient out of 
an unusually dark, un-English face, with straight 
black hair, and listened attentively to his rather 
incoherent story. It was a story very much 
modified and rounded off. Nor did Lawford 
draw Dr. Simon’s attention to the portrait, now 
smiling conventionally above their heads from 
the wall over the fireplace. 

'Tt was rather bleak — the wind; and I think, 
perhaps, I had had a touch of influenza. It 
was a silly thing to do. But still. Dr. Simon, one 
does n’t expect — well, there, I don’t feel the 
same man — ^physically. I really cannot explain 
how great a change has taken place. And yet 
I feel perfectly fit in myself. And if it were not 
for — for being laughed at, I ’d go back to town, 
to-day. Why my wife scarcely recognised me.” 

Dr. Simon continued his scrutiny. Try as he 
would, Lawford could not raise his downcast 
eyes to meet direct the doctor’s polite attention. 

‘‘And what,” said Dr. Simon, “what precisely 
is the nature of the change? Have you any 
pain?” 

“No, not the least pain,” said Mr. Lawford; 
“I think, perhaps, or rather my face is a little 
shrunken — and yet — lengthened; at least it feels 
so; and a faint twinge of rheumatism. But my 
hair — well, I don’t know; it’s difficult to say 


5 


66 


The Return 


one’s self. ” He could get on so very much better, 
he thought, if only his mind would be at peace and 
these preposterous promptings and voices were 
still. 

Dr. Simon faced the window, and drew his 
hand softly over his head. ^‘We never can be 
too cautious at a certain age, and especially 
after influenza,” he said. “It undermines the 
whole system, and in particular the nervous 
system; leaving the mind the prey of the most 
melancholy fancies. I should astound you, Mr. 
Lawford, with the devil influenza plays. . . . 
A slight nervous shock and a chill; quite slight, I 
hope. A few days’ rest and plenty of nourish- 
ment. There ’s nothing; temperature inconsider- 
able. All perfectly intelligible. Most certainly 
reassure yourself! And as for the change you 
speak of” — he looked steadily at the dark face 
on the pillow and smiled amiably — “I don’t 
think we need worry much about that. It cer- 
tainly was a bleak wind yesterday — and a ceme- 
tery; my dear sir! It was indiscreet — yes, very.” 
He held out his hand. “You must not be alarmed, ’ ’ 
he said, very distinctly, with the merest trace of 
an accent; “air, sunshine, quiet, nourishment, 
sleep — that is all. The little window might be a 
few inches open, and — and any light reading.” 

He opened the door and joined Mrs. Lawford 
on the staircase. He talked to her quietly over 
his shoulder all the way down-stairs. “It was, 


6 ? 


The Morning After 

it was sporting with Providence — a wind, believe 
me, nearly due east, in spite of the warm sunshine.’' 

“But the change — the change!” Mrs. Law- 
ford managed to murmur tragically, as he strode 
to the door. Dr. Simon smiled, and gracefully 
tapped his forehead with a red-gloved forefinger. 

“Humour him, humour him,” he repeated 
indulgently. “Rest and quiet will soon put 
that little — trouble out of his head. Oh, yes, 
I did notice it — the set, drawn look, and the droop : 
quite so. Good morning. ” 

Mrs. Lawford gently closed the door after 
him. A glimpse of Ada, crossing from room 
to room, suggested a precaution. She called 
out in her clearest notes : “If Dr. Ferguson should 
call while I am out, Ada, will you please tell him 
that Dr. Simon regretted that he was unable to 
wait? Thank you.” She paused with hand on 
the balusters, then slowly ascended the stairs. 
Her husband’s face was turned to the ceiling, 
his hands clasped above his head. She took 
up her stand by the fireplace, resting one silk- 
slippered foot on the fender. “Dr. Simon is 
reassuring,” she said, “but I do hope, Arthur, 
you will follow out his advice. . . . He looks 
a fairly clever man. ... But with a big practice. 
. . . Do you think, dear, he quite realised the 
extent of the — the change?” 

“I told him what h^ippened, ” said her husband’s 
voice out of the bedclothes. 


68 


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^^Yes, yes, I know,” said Sheila soothingly; 
^‘but we must remember he is comparatively a 
stranger. He would not detect . . 

^‘What did he tell you?” asked the voice. 

Mrs. Lawford deliberately considered. If only 
he would always thus keep his face concealed, 
how much easier it would be to discuss matters 
rationally! ^‘You see, dear,” she said softly, 
know, of course, nothing about the nerves, but 
personally, I think his suggestion absurd. No 
mere fancy, surely, can make a lasting alteration 
in one’s face. And your hair — I don’t want 
to say anything that may seem unkind — but 
is n’t it really quite a distinct shade darker, 
Arthur?” 

‘^Any great strain will change the colour of 
a man’s hair,” said Lawford stolidly; “at any 
rate, to white. Why, I read once of a fellow 
in India, a Hindoo, or something, who ” 

“But have you had any intense strain, or 
anxiety?” broke in Sheila. “You might,' at 
least, have confided in me; that is, useless — 
But there, don’t you think really, Arthur, it 
would be much more satisfactory in every way 
if we had further advice at once? Alice will 
be home next week. To-morrow is the Harvest 
Festival, and next week, of course, the Dedication; 
and, in any case, the Bazaar is out of the question. 
They will have to find another stallholder. We 
must do our utmost to avoid comment or scandal. 


69 


The Morning After 

Every minute must help to — to fix a thing like 
that. I own even now I cannot realise what 
this awful calamity means. It ’s useless to brood 
on it. We must, as the poor dear old vicar said 
only last night, keep our heads clear. But I 
am sure Dr. Simon was under a misapprehension. 
If, now, it was explained to him, a little more 
fully, Arthur — a photograph. Oh, anything on 
earth but this dreadful wearing uncertainty 
and suspense! Besides ... is Simon quite an 
English name?” 

Lawford drew further into his pillow. ‘^Do 
as you think best, Sheila,” he said. “For my 
own part, I believe it may be as he suggests — 
partly an illusion, a touch of nervous breakdown. 
It simply can’t be as bad as I think it is. If it 
were, you would not be here talking like this; 
and Bethany would n’t have believed a word 
I said. Whatever it is, it ’s no good crying it 
on the housetops. Give me time, just time. 
Besides, how do we know what he really thought? 
Doctors don’t tell their patients everything. 
Give the poor chap a chance, and more so if he 
is a foreigner. He’s” — his voice sank almost 
to a whisper — “he ’s no darker than this. And 
do, please, Sheila, take this infernal stuff away, 
and let me have something solid. I ’m not ill — 
in that way. All I want is peace and quiet, time 
to think. Let me fight it out alone. It ’s been 
sprung on me. The worst ’s not over. But I ’ll 


70 


The Return 


win through; wait! And if not — well, you shall 
not suffer, Sheila. Don’t be afraid! There are 
other ways out. ” 

Sheila broke down. “Any one would think, 
to hear you talk, that I was perfectly heartless. 
I told Ada to be most careful about the cornflour. 
And as for other ways out, it ’s a positively 
wicked thing to say to me when I ’m nearly dis- 
tracted with trouble and anxiety. What motive 
could you have had for loitering in an old ceme- 
tery? And in an east wind! It’s useless for 
me to remain here, Arthur, to be accused of every 
horrible thing that comes into a morbid imagin- 
ation. I will leave you, as you suggest, in 
peace.” 

“One moment, Sheila,” answered the muffled 
voice. “I have accused you of nothing. If you 
knew all, if you could read my thoughts, you 
would be surprised, perhaps, at my — On the 
other hand, I really do think, Sheila, it would 
be better for the present to discuss the thing no 
more. To-day is Friday. Give this miserable 
face a week. Talk it over with Bethany if you 
like. But I forbid” — he struggled up in bed, 
sallow and sinister — “I flatly forbid, please imder- 
stand, any other interference till then. After- 
wards you must do exactly as you please. Send 
round the Town Crier! But till then, silence!” 

Sheila, with raised head , confronted him . ‘ ‘ This , 
then, is your gratitude! So be it! Silence, no 


71 


The Morning After 

doubt ! until it too late to take action, until 
you have wormed your way in, and think you 
are safe. To have believed! Where is my hus- 
band? that is what I am asking you now. When 
and how you have learned his secrets God only 
knows, and your conscience! But he always 
was a simpleton at heart. I warn you, then. 
Until next Thursday I consent to say nothing 
provided you remain quiet; make no disturb- 
ance, no scandal here. The servants and all who 
inquire shall simply be told that my husband is 
confined to his room with — ^with a nervous break- 
down, as you have yourself so glibly suggested. 
I am at your mercy, I own it. The vicar believes 
your preposterous story — with his spectacles off. 
You would convince anybody with the wicked 
cunning with which you have cajoled and whee- 
dled him, with which you have deceived and fooled 
a foreign doctor. But you will not convince me. 
You will not convince Alice. I have friends in 
the world, though you may not be aware of it, 
who will not be quite so apt to believe any cock- 
and-bull story you may see fit to invent. That 
is all I have to say. To-night I tell the vicar 
all that I have just told you. And from this 
moment, please, we are strangers. I shall come 
into the room no more than necessity dictates. 
On Friday we resume our real parts. My hus- 
band . . . Arthur to . . . connive at . . . Phh!’* 
Rage had transfigured her. She scarcely heard 


72 


The Return 


her own words. They poured out senselessly, 
monotonously, one calling up another, as if from 
the lips of a Cassandra. Lawford sank back into 
bed, clutching the sheets with both lean hands. 
He took a deep breath and shut his mouth. 

^Tt reminds me, Sheila,” he began arduously, 
^‘of our first quarrel before we were married, 
the evening after your aunt Rose died at Llan- 
dudno — do you remember? You threw open the 
window, and I think — I saved your life.” A 
pause followed. Then a queer, almost inarticu- 
late voice added, “At least, I am afraid so!” 

A cold and awful quietness fell on Sheila’s 
heart. She stared fixedly at the tuft of dark 
hair, the only visible sign of her husband on the 
pillow. Then, taking up the basin of cold corn- 
flour, she left the room. In a quarter of an hour 
she reappeared carrying a tray, with ham and 
eggs and coffee and honey invitingly displayed. 
She laid it down. 

“There is only one other question,” she said, 
with perfect composure, ‘ ‘ that of money. Y our sig- 
nature as it appears on the — the document drawn 
up this morning, would, of course, be quite useless 
on a cheque. I have, of course, taken all the 
money I could find of my husband’s ; it is in safety. 
You may, however, conceivably be in need of 
money; here is five pounds. I have my own 
cheque-book, and shall therefore have no need 
to consider the question again for — for the present. 


73 


The Morning After 

So far as you are concerned, I shall be guided 
solely by Mr. Bethany. He will, I do not doubt, 
take full responsibility.” 

“And may the Lord have mercy on my soul!” 
uttered a stifled, unfamiliar voice from the bed. 
Mrs. Lawford stooped. “Arthur!” she cried 
faintly, “Arthur!” 

Lawford raised himself on his elbow with a sigh 
that was very near to being a sob. “Oh, Sheila, 
if you ^d only be your real self ! What is the use 
of all this pretence? Just consider my position 
a little. The fear and horror are not all on your 
side, dear. You called me Arthur even then. I ’d 
willingly do anything you wish to save you pain ; 
you know that. Can’t we be friends even in 
this — this ghastly — Won’t you, Sheila?” 

Mrs. Lawford drew back, struggling with a 
doubtful heart. 

“I think,” she said, “it would be better not 
to discuss that now. ” 

The rest of the morning Lawford remained 
in solitude. 


CHAPTER VI 


THE PROMPTINGS OF THE OTHER 

There were three books in the room — ^Jeremy 
Taylor’s Holy Living and Dying, a volume 
of the Quiver, and a little gilded book on wild- 
flowers. He read in vain. He lay and listened to 
the uproar of his thoughts on which an occasional 
sound — the droning of a fly, the cry of a milk- 
man, the noise of a passing van — obtruded from 
the workaday world. The pale gold sunlight 
edged softly over the bed. He ate up every- 
thing on his tray. He even, on the shoals of 
nightmare, dreamed awhile. But by and by as 
the hours wheeled slowly on he grew less calm, 
less strenuously resolved on lying there inactive. 
Every sparrow that twittered cried reveille 
through his brain. He longed with an ardour 
strange to his temperament to be up and doing. 
What if it was, as he had in the excitement of 
the moment suggested to Sheila, only a morbid 
delusion of mind, shared too in part by sheer 
force of his absurd confession? Even if he was 
going mad, who knows how peaceful a release 
74 


The Promptings of the Other 75 

that might not be? Could his shrewd old vicar 
have implicitly believed in him if the change were 
as complete as he supposed it? He flung off 
the bedclothes and locked the door. He dressed 
himself, noticing, he fancied, with a deadly revul- 
sion of feeling, that his coat was a little too short 
in the sleeves, his waistcoat too loose. In the 
midst of his dressing came Sheila bringing his 
luncheon. *T’m sorry,’* he called out, stooping 
quickly beside the bed, ** I can’t talk now. Please 
put the tray down.” 

About half an hour afterwards he heard the 
door close, and peeping from behind the curtains 
saw his wife go out. All was drowsily quiet in 
the house. He devoured his lunch like a school- 
boy. That finished to the last crumb, without 
a moment’s delay he covered his face with a 
towel, locked the door behind him, put the key 
in his pocket, and ran lightly down-stairs. He 
stuffed the towel into an ulster pocket, put on 
a soft, wide-brimmed hat, and let himself noise- 
lessly out. Then he turned with an almost 
hysterical delight and ran — ran like the wind, 
without pausing, without thinking, straight on, 
up one turning, down another, until he reached 
a broad open common, thicky wooded, sprinkled 
with gorse and hazel and may, and faintly purple 
with fading heather. There he flimg himself down 
in the beautiful sunlight, among the yellowing 
bracken to recover his breath. 


76 


The Return 


He lay there for many minutes, thinking almost 
with composure. Flight, it seemed, had for the 
moment quietened the demands of that other 
feebly struggling personality which was beginning 
to insinuate itself into his consciousness, which 
had so miraculously broken in and taken posses- 
sion of his body. He would not think now. All 
he needed was a little quiet and patience before 
he threw off for good and all his right to be free, 
to be his own master, to call himself sane. 

He scrambled up and turned his face towards 
the westering sun. What was there in the still- 
ness of its beautiful splendour that seemed to 
sharpen his horror and difficulty, and yet to stir 
him to such a daring and devilry as he had never 
known since he was a boy ? There was little sound 
of life; somewhere an unknown bird was singing, 
and a few late bees were droning in the bracken. 
All these years he had, like an old blind horse, 
stolidly plodded round and round in a dull self-set 
routine. And now, just when the spirit had come 
for rebellion, the mood for a harmless truancy, 
there had fallen with them too this hideous enigma. 
He sat there with the dusky silhouette of the 
face that was now drenched with sunlight in his 
mind’s eye. He set off again up the stony [incline. 
Why not walk on and on? In time real whole- 
some weariness would come; he could sleep at 
ease in some pleasant wayside inn, without once 
meeting the eyes that stood as it were like a 


The Promptings of the Other 77 

window between himself and a shrewd, incredu- 
lous scoffing world that would turn him into a 
monstrosity and his story into a fable. And in a 
Httle while, perhaps in three days, he would 
awaken out of this engrossing nightmare, and 
know he was free, this black dog gone from his 
back, and (as the old saying expressed it without 
any one dreaming what it really meant) his own 
man again. How astonished Sheila would be; 
how warmly she would welcome him ! Oh, yes, of 
course she would. He came again to a stand- 
still. But no voice answered him out of that 
illimitable gold and blue. Nothing seemed aware 
of him. And as he stood there, doubtful as 
Cain on the outskirts of the unknown, he caught 
the sound of a footfall on the lonely and stony 
path. 

The ground sloped steeply away to the left, 
and slowly mounting the hillside came mildly on 
an old lady he knew, a Miss Sinnet, an old friend 
of his mother’s. There was just such a little 
seat as that other he knew so well, on the brow 
of the hill. He made his way to it, intending to 
sit quietly there until the little old lady had passed 
by. Up and up she came. Her large bonnet 
appeared, and then her mild white face, inclined 
a little towards him as she ascended. Evidently 
this very seat was her goal; and evasion was 
impossible. “Evasion!” Memory rushed back 
and set his pulses beating. He turned boldly to 


78 


The Return 


the sun, and the old lady, with a brief glance 
into his face, composed herself at the other end 
of the little seat. She gazed out of a gentle 
reverie into the golden valley. And so they 
sat a while. And almost as if she had felt the 
bond of acquaintance between them, she pre- 
sently sighed, and addressed him : ^ ‘ A very, very, 

beautiful view, sir.” 

Lawford paused, then turned a gloomy, earnest 
face, gilded with simshine. ‘‘Beautiful, indeed,” 
he said, “But not for me. No, Miss Sinnet, 
not for me.” 

The old lady gravely turned and examined 
the aquiline profile. “Well, I confess, sir,” she 
remarked urbanely, “you have the advantage 
of me.” 

Lawford smiled uneasily. “Believe me, it 
is little advantage. ” 

“My sight,” said Miss Sinnet precisely, “is not 
so good as I might wish; though better per- 
haps than I might have hoped; I fear I am not 
much wiser, sir; your face is still unfamiliar to 
me. 

“ It is not less unfamiliar to me, ” said Lawford. 
Whose trickery was this? he thought, putting 
such affected stuff into his mouth. 

A faint lightening of pity came into the silvery 
and scrupulous countenance. “Ah, dear me, 
yes, ” she said courteously. 

Lawford rested a lean hand on the seat. “And 


The Promptings of the Other 79 

have you,” he asked, ''not the least recollection 
in the world of my face?” 

"Now really, sir,” she said, smiling blandly, 
"is that quite fair? Think of all the scores and 
scores of faces in seventy long years; and how 
very treacherous memory is! You shall do me 
the service of reminding me of one whose name 
has for the moment escaped me. ” 

"I am the son of a very old friend of yours, 
Miss Sinnet,” said Lawford quietly; "a friend 
that was once your schoolfellow at Brighton.” 

"Well, now,” said the old lady, grasping her 
umbrella, "that is undoubtedly a clue; but then, 
you see, all but one of the friends of my girlhood 
are dead ; and if I have never had the pleasure of 
meeting her son, unless there is a decided resem- 
blance, how am I to recollect her by looking at 
him?'' 

"There is, I believe, a likeness,” said Lawford. 

She nodded her great bonnet at him with gentle 
amusement. "You are insistent in your fancy. 
Well, let me think again. The last to leave me 
was Fanny Urquhart, that was — let me see — 
last October. Now you are certainly not Fanny 
Urquhart’s son,” she stopped austerely, "for she 
never had one. Last year, too, I heard that 
my dear, dear Mrs. Jameson was dead. Her I 
hadn’t met for many, many years. But, if I 
may venture to say so, yours is not a Scottish 
face ; and she not only married a Scottish husband 


8o 


The Return 


but was herself a Dunbar. No, I am still at 
a loss.’^ 

A miserable strife was in her chance com- 
panion’s mind, a strife of anger and recrimination. 
He turned his eyes wearily to the fast declining 
sun. ^‘You will forgive my persistency, but I 
assure you it is a matter of life or death to me. Is 
there no one my face recalls? My voice?” 

Miss Sinnet drew her long lips together, her 
eyebrows lifted with the faintest perturbation. 
^‘But he certainly knows my name,” she said 
to herself. She turned once more, and in this 
still, autumnal beauty, beneath this pale blue arch 
of evening, these two human beings confronted 
one another again. She eyed him blandly, yet 
with a certain grave directness. 

“I don’t really think,” she said, ‘‘you can be 
Mary Lawford’s son. I could scarcely have 
mistaken him,'' 

Lawford gulped and turned away. He hardly 
knew what this surge of feeling meant. Was 
it hope, despair, resentment; had he caught 
even the echo of an unholy joy? His mind for 
a moment became confused as if in the tumult 
of a struggle. He heard himself expostulate, 
“Ah, Miss Bennett, I fear I set you too difficult 
a task.” 

The old lady drew abruptly in, like a trust- 
ful and gentle snail into its shocked house. ‘ ‘ Ben- 
nett, sir; but my name is not Bennett.” 


The Promptings of the Other 8i 

And again Lawford accepted the miserable 
prompting. “Not Bennett! . . . How can I 
ever then apologise for so frantic a mistake?” 

The little old lady took firm hold of her um- 
brella. She did not answer him. “The likeness, 
the likeness!” he began unctuously, and stopped, 
for the glance that dwelt fleetingly on him was 
cold with the formidable dignity and displeasure 
of age. He raised his hat and turned miserably 
home. He strode on out of the last gold into 
the blue twilight. What fantastic foolery of 
mind was mastering him? He cast a hurried 
look over his shoulder at the kindly and offended 
old figure sitting there, solitary, on the little seat, 
in her great bonnet, with back turned resolutely 
upon him — the friend of his dead mother who 
might have proved in his need a friend indeed 
to him. And he had by this insane caprice 
hopelessly estranged her. She would remember 
this face well enough now, he thought bitterly, 
and would take her place among his quiet enemies, 
if ever the day of reckoning should come. It 
was scandalous, it was banal to have abused her 
trust and courtesy. Oh, it was hopeless to 
struggle any more ! The fates were against 
him. They had played him a trick. He was 
to be their transitory sport, as many a better 
man he could himself recollect had been before 
him. He would go home and give in: let Sheila 
do with him what she pleased. No one but a 
6 


82 


The Return 


lunatic could have acted as he had, with just 
that frantic hint of method so remarkable in 
the insane. 

He left the common. A lamplighter was I'ght- 
ing the lamps. A thin evening haze was on the 
air. If only he had stayed at home that fateful 
afternoon ! Who, what had induced him, enticed 
him to venture out? And even with the thought 
welled up into his mind an intense desire to go 
to the old, green, time-worn churchyard again; 
to sit there contentedly alone, where none heeded 
the completest metamorphosis, down beside the 
yew-trees. What a fool he had been! There 
alone, of course, lay his only possible chance 
of recovery. He would go to-morrow. Perhaps 
Sheila had not yet discovered his absence; and 
there would be no difficulty in repeating so suc- 
cessful a stratagem. Remembrance of his miser- 
able mistake, of Miss Sinnet, faintly returned 
to him as he swiftly mounted the steps to his 
porch. Poor old lady I He would make amends 
for his discourtesy when he wa^ quite himself 
again. She should some day near, perhaps, 
his infinitely tragic, infinitely comic experience 
from his own lips. He would take her some 
flowers, some old keepsake of his mother’s. What 
would he not do when the old moods and brains 
of the stupid Arthur Lawford, when he had 
appreciated so little and so superficially, came 
back to him. 


The Promptings of the Other 83 

He ran up the steps and stopped dead, his 
hand in his pocket, chilled and aghast. Sheila 
had taken his keys. He stood there, dazed 
and still, beneath the dim yellow of his own fan- 
light; and once again that inward spring flew 
back. “Brazen it out; brazen it out! Knock 
and ring ! ” He knocked flamboyantly, and rang. 

There came a quiet step and the door opened. 
“Dr. Simon, of course, has called ?“ he inquired 
suavely. 

“Yes, sir.’’ 

“Ah, and gone? — as I feared! And Mrs. 
Lawford?’’ 

“I think Mrs. Lawford is in, sir.” 

Lawford put out a detaining hand. “We 
will not disturb her; we will not disturb her. 
I can And my way up; oh, yes, thank you!” 

But Ada still palely barred the way. “I think, 
sir,” she said, “Mrs. Lawford would prefer to 
see you herself; she told me most > particularly 
^all callers.’ And Mr. Lawford was not to be 
disturbed on any account. ” 

“Disturbed! God forbid!” said Lawford, but 
dark eyes failed to move these palest hazel. 
“Well,” he continued nonchalantly, “perhaps — 
perhaps it would be as well if Mrs. Lawford should 
know that I am here. No, thank you, I won’t 
come in. Please go and tell — ” But even as the 
maid turned to obey, Sheila herself appeared 
at the dining-room door in hat and veil. 


84 


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Lawford hesitated an immeasurable moment. 
In one swift glance he perceived the lamplit 
mystery of evening, beckoning, calling, pleading 
— Fly, fly! Home ’s here for you! Begin again, 
begin again! And there before him in quiet 
and hostile decorum stood maid and mistress. 
He took off his hat and stepped quickly in. “So 
late, so very late, I fear,” he began glibly. “A 
sudden call, a perfectly impossible distance. 
Shall we disturb him, do you think?” 

“Would n’t it,” began Sheila softly, “be rather 
a pity perhaps? Dr. Simon seemed to think — 
But, of course, you must decide that.” 

Ada turned quiet, small eyes. 

“No, no, by no means,” he almost mumbled. 

And a hard, slow smile passed over Sheila’s 
face. “Excuse me one moment,” she said; 
“I will see if he is awake.” She swept swiftly 
forward, superb and triumphant, beneath the 
gaze of those dark, restless eyes. But so still 
was home and street that quite distinctly a clear 
and youthful laughter was heard, and light foot- 
steps approaching. Sheila paused. Ada, in the 
act of closing the door, peered out. “ Miss Alice, 
ma’am, ” she said. 

And in this infinitesimal advantage of time 
Dr. Ferguson had seized his vanishing oppor- 
tunity, and was already swiftly mounting the 
stairs. Mrs. Lawford stood with veil half raised 
and coldly smiling lips and, as if it were by pre- 


The Promptings of the Other 85 

arrangement, her daughter’s laughing greeting 
from the garden, and, from the landing above 
her, a faint “Ah, and how are we now?’’ broke 
out simultaneously. And Ada, silent and dis- 
creet, had thrown open the door again to the 
twilight and to the young people ascending the 
steps. 

Lawford was still sitting on his bed before 
a cold and ashy hearth when Sheila knocked at 
the door. 

“Yes?” he said; “who ’s there?” No answer 
followed. He rose with a shuddering sigh and 
turned the key. His wife entered. “That little 
exhibition of finesse was part of our agreement, 
I suppose?” 

“I say — ” began Lawford. 

“To creep out in my absence like a thief, and 
to return like a mountebank; that was part of 
our compact. ” 

“I say,” he stubbornly began again, “did 
you wire for Alice?” 

“Will you please answer my question? Am 
I to be a mere catspaw in your intrigues, in this 
miserable masquerade before the servants? To 
set the whole place ringing with the name of a 
doctor that does n’t exist, and a bedridden patient 
that slips out of the house with his bedroom 
key in his pocket ! Are you aware that the maid 
has been hammering at your door every half-hour 
of your absence? Are you aware of that? How 


86 


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much, she continued in a low, bitter voice, '‘how 
much should I offer for her discretion?” 

“Who was that with Alice?” inquired the 
same toneless voice. 

“I refuse to be ignored. I refuse to be made 
a child of. Will you please answer me?” 

Lawford turned. “Look here, Sheila,” he 
began heavily, ‘ ‘ what about Alice ? If you wired : 
well, it ’s useless to say anything more. But if 
you did n’t, I ask you just this one thing. Don’t 
tell her!” 

“Oh, I perfectly appreciate a father’s natural 
anxiety.” 

Her husband drew up his shoulders as if to 
receive a blow. “Yes, yes,” he said, “but you 
won’t?” 

The sound of a young laughing voice came 
faintly up from below. “How did Jimmie 
Fortescue know she was coming home to-day?” 

“Will you not inquire of Jimmie Fortescue 
for yourself?” 

“Oh, what is the use of sneering?” began the 
dull voice again. “I am horribly tired, Sheila. 
And try how you will, you can’t convince me 
that you believe for a moment I am not — my- 
self, that you are as hard as you pretend. An 
acquaintance, even a friend might be deceived; 
but husband and wife — oh, no! It isn’t only a 
man’s face that ’s himself — or even his hands.” 
He looked at them, straightened them slowly 


The Promptings of the Other 87 

out, and buried them in his pockets. ^‘All I 
care about now is Alice. Is she, or is she not 
going to be told? I am simply asking you to 
give her just a chance. ” 

^Simply asking me to give Alice a chance*; 
now is n’t that really just a little . . . ?” 

Lawford slowly shook his head. ^^You know 
in your heart it isn’t, Sheila; you understand 
me quite well, although you persistently pretend 
not to. I can’t argue now. I can’t speak up 
for myself. I am just about as far down as I 
can go. It ’s only Alice. ” 

‘‘I see; a lucid interval?” suggested his wife 
in a low, trembling voice. 

^‘Yes, yes, if you like,” said her husband 
patiently, ”‘a lucid interval.’ Please don’t look 
at my face like that, Sheila, think — think that 
it ’s just lupus, just some horrible disfigurement.” 

Not much Hght was in the large room, and 
there was something so extraordinarily character- 
istic of her husband in those stooping shoulders, 
in the head hung a little forward, and in the 
preternaturally solemn voice, that Sheila had 
to bend a little over the bed to catch a glimpse 
of the sallow and keener face again. She sighed ; 
and even on her own strained ear her sigh 
sounded almost like one of relief. 

“It’s useless, I know, to ask you anything 
while you are in this mood,” continued Lawford 
dully; ^‘I know that of old.” 


88 


The Return 


The white, ringed hands clenched. 
old!’’^ 

“I didn’t mean anything. Don’t listen to 
what I say. It ’s only — it ’s just Alice knowing, 
that was all; I mean — at once.” 

“Don’t for a moment suppose I am not per- 
fectly aware that it is only Alice you think of. 
You were particularly anxious about my feelings 
weren’t you? You broke the news to me with 
the tenderest solicitude. I am glad our — our 
daughter shares my husband’s love.” 

“Look here,” said Lawford densely, “you 
know that I love you as much as ever ; but with 
this — as I am — what would be the good of my 
saying so?” Mrs. Lawford took a deep breath. 
And a voice called softly at the door: 

“Mother, are you there? Is father awake? 
May I come in?” 

In a flash the memory returned to her ; twenty- 
four hours ago she was asking that very question 
of this unspeakable figure that sat hunched up 
before her. 

“One moment, dear,” she called, and added 
in a very low voice, “Come here!” 

Lawford looked up. “What?” he said. 

“ Perhaps, perhaps, ” she whispered, “it isn’t 
quite so bad.” 

“For mercy’s sake, Sheila,” he said, “don’t 
torture me; tell the poor child to go away.” 

She paused. “Are you there, Alice? Would 


The Promptings of the Other 89 

you mind, father says, waiting a little? He is 
so very tired.” 

^‘Too tired to . . . Oh, very well, mother.” 

Mrs. Lawford opened the door, and called 
after her, “ Is Jimmie gone ? ” 

“Oh, yes, hours.” 

“Where did you meet?” 

“I couldn’t get a carriage at the station. He 
carried my dressing-bag ; I begged him not 
to. The other’s coming on. You know what 
Jimmie is. How very, very lucky I did come 
home. I don’t know what made me; just an 
impulse ; they did laugh at me so. Father dear — 
do speak to me; how are you now?” 

Lawford opened his mouth, gulped, and shook 
his head. 

“Ssh, dear!” whispered Sheila, “I think he 
has fallen asleep. I will be down in a minute.” 
Mrs. Lawford was about to close the door when 
Ada appeared. 

“If you please, ma’am,” she said, “I have 
been waiting, as you told me, to let Dr. Ferguson 
out, but it ’s nearly seven, ma’am ; and the 
table ’s not laid yet. ” 

Sheila turned and looked over her shoulder 
into the room. “Do you think you will need 
anything more. Dr. Ferguson?” she asked in 
a sepulchral voice. 

Again Lawford’s lips moved; again he shook 
his head. 


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‘*0ne moment, Ada,” she saidi closing the 
door, “Some more medicine — what medicine? 
Quick! She mustn’t suspect.” 

“ ‘ What medicine? ’ ” repeated Lawford stolidly. 

“Oh, vexing, . vexing ; don’t you see we must 
send her out? Don’t you see? What was 
it you sent to Critchett’s for last night? Tell 
him that’s gone: we want more of 

Lawford stared heavily. “Oh, yes, yes,” he 
said thickly, “more of that ...” 

Sheila, with a shrug of extreme distaste and 
vexation, hastily opened the door. “Dr. Fer- 
guson wants a further supply of the drug which 
Mr. Critchett made up for Mr. Lawford yesterday 
evening. You had better go at once, Ada, and 
please make as much haste as you can.” 

“I say, I say,” began Lawford; but it was 
too late, the door was shut. 

‘ ‘ How I detest this wretched falsehood and sub- 
terfuge! What could have induced you . . . ” 

“Yes,” said her husband, “what! I think 
I ’ll be getting to bed again, Sheila ; I forgot 
I had been ill. And now I do really feel very 
tired. But I should like to feel — in spite of this 
hideous — I should like to feel we are friends, 
Sheila. ” 

Sheila almost imperceptibly shuddered, crossed 
the room, and faced the still, almost lifeless mask. 
“I spoke,” she said, “in a temper this morning. 
You must try to understand what a shock it 


The Promptings of the Other 91 

has been to me. Now, I own it frankly, I know 
you are — Arthur. But God only knows how 
it frightens me, and — and — horrifies me.’’ She 
shut her eyes beneath her veil. They waited 
on in silence a while. 

^‘Poor boy!” she said at last, lightly touching 
the loose sleeve; “be brave; it will all come right, 
soon. Meanwhile, for Alice’s sake, if not for 
mine, don’t give way to — to caprices, and all 
that. Keep quietly here, Arthur! And — and 
forgive my impatience.” 

He put out his hand as if to touch her. “For- 
give you!” he said humbly, pushing it stub- 
bornly back into his pocket again. “Oh, Sheila, 
the forgiveness is all on your side. You know 
I have nothing to forgive.” Again silence fell 
between them. 

“Then, to-night,” said Sheila wearily, draw- 
ing back, “we say nothing to Alice, except that 
you are too tired — just nervous prostration — 
to see her. What we should do without this 
influenza, I cannot conceive. Mr. Bethany 
will probably look in on his way home; and then 
we can talk it over — ^we can talk it over again. 
So long as you are like this, yourself, in mind, 
why! . . . What is it now?” she broke off 
querulously. 

“If you please, ma’am, Mr. Critchett says 
he does n’t know Dr. Ferguson, his name ’s not 
in the Directory, and there must be something 


92 


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wrong with the message, and he ’s sorry, but he 
must have it in writing because there was more 
even in the first packet than he ought by rights 
to send. What shall I do, m’m?’' 

Still looking at her husband, Sheila listened 
quietly to the end, and then, as if in disdain, 
she deliberately shrugged her shoulders, and 
went out to play her part unaided. 


CHAPTER VII 


FATHER AND DAUGHTER 

Her husband turned wearily once more, and draw- 
ing up a chair sat down in front of the cold grate. 
He realised that Sheila thought him as much of a 
fool now as she had for the moment thought him 
an impostor, or something worse, the night before. 
That was at least something gained. He realised, 
too, in a vague way that the exuberance of mind 
that had practically invented Dr. Ferguson, and 
outraged Miss Sinnet, had quite suddenly flickered 
out. It was astonishing, he thought, with gaze 
fixed innocently on the black coals, that he should 
ever have done such things. He detested that 
kind of ^‘rof; that showy, theatrical, Jewish pose 
so many men prided their jackdaw brains about. 
And he sat quite still, like a cat at a cranny, 
listening, as it were, for the faintest, remotest 
stir that might hint at any return of this — activity. 
It was the first really sane moment he had had 
since the “change.” Whatever it was that had 
happened at Widderstone was now distinctly 
weakening in effect. Why, now, perhaps! He 
93 


94 


The Return 


stole a thievish look over his shoulder at the glass, 
and cautiously drew finger and thumb down that 
beaked nose. Then he really quietly smiled, a 
smile he felt this abominable facial caricature was 
quite unused to, the superior Lawford smile of 
guileless contempt for the fanatical, the fantastic, 
and the bizarre. He would n’t have sat with his 
feet on the fender before a burnt-out fire. And 
the animosity of that “he,” uttered only just 
under his breath, surprised even himself. It actu- 
ally did seem as if there were a chance ; if only he 
kept cool and collected. If the whole mind of a 
man was bent on being one thing, surely no power 
on earth, certainly not on earth, could for long 
compel him to look another, any more (followed 
the resplendent thought) than vice versa. 

That, in fact, was the trick that had been in 
fitful fashion played him since yesterday. Ob- 
viously, and apart altogether from his promise to 
Sheila, the best possible thing he could do would 
be to walk quietly over to Widderstone to-morrow 
and, simply covering precisely the same ground, 
like a child that has lost a penny, reverse the 
process: look at the graves, read the inscriptions 
on the weather-beaten stones, compose himself 
to sleep on the little seat. Magic, witchcraft, 
possession, and all that — well, Mr. Bethany might 
prefer to take it on the authority of the Bible 
if it was his duty. But it was at least mainly Old 
Testament stuff, like polygamy, Joshua, and the 


Father and Daughter 95 

'^unclean beasts.” The “unclean beasts.” It 
was simply, as Simon had said, mainly an affair of 
the nerves, like Indian jugglery. He had heard of 
dozens of such cases, or similar cases. And it was 
hardly likely that cases exactly like his own would 
be much bragged about, or advertised. All those 
mysterious “disappearances,” too, which one 
reads about so repeatedly? What of them? 
Even now, he felt (and glanced swiftly behind 
him at the fancy), it would be better to think as 
softly as possible, not to hope too openly, cer- 
tainly not to triumph in the least degree, just in 
case of — ^well — listeners. He would wrap up too. 
And he would n’t tell Sheila of the project till 
he had come safely back. What splendid fun it 
would be to confess meekly to his escapade, and 
to be scolded, and then suddenly to reveal him- 
self! He sat back and gazed with an almost 
malignant animosity at the face in the portrait, 
comely and plump. 

An inarticulate, unfathomable depression rolled 
back on him, like a mist out of the sea. He hastily 
undressed, put watch and door-key and Critchett’s 
powder under his pillow, paused, vacantly rumin- 
ated, and then replaced the powder in his waist- 
coat pocket, said his prayers, and got shivering to 
bed. He did not feel hurt at Sheila’s leaving him 
like this — so long as she really believed in him! 
And now — ^Alice was home! He listened, trying 
not to shiver, for her voice ; and sometimes heard. 


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he fancied, the clear note. It was this beastly 
influenza that made him feel so cold and Hfeless. 
But all would soon come right — that is, if only 
that face, luminous against the floating darkness 
within, would not appear the instant he closed his 
eyes. 

But legions of dreams are Influenza’s allies. He 
fell into a chill doze, heard voices innumerable, 
and one above the rest, shouting them down, until 
there fell a lull, and one, as it were, from far away 
said quite clearly and distinctly, “Why, my dear 
friend, surely you have heard the story of the poor 
old charwoman who talked Greek in her delirium ! 
A little school French need not alarm us.” And 
Lawford opened his eyes again on Mr. Bethany 
standing at his bedside. 

“ Tt, tt ! There, I Ve been and waked him. And 
yet they say men make such excellent nurses in 
time of war. But there, Lawford, what did I tell 
you? Was n’t I, now, an infallible prophet? Your 
wife has been giving me a most glowing account — 
quite your old self, she tells me, except for just 
this — this touch of facial paralysis. And I think, 
do you know” (the kind old creature stooped over 
the bed, but still, Lawford noticed bitterly, still 
without his spectacles) — “yes, I really think there 
is a decided improvement; not quite so — drawn. 
We must make haste slowly. Wedderburn, you 
know, believes profoundly in Simon; pulled his 
wife through a most dangerous confinement . Don ’ t 


97 


Father and Daughter 

tell a doctor too much! Too many symptoms 
rouse his wrath. And here ’s pills and tonics and 
liniments — a whole chemist’s shop. Oh, we are 
getting on swimmingly.” 

Flamelight was flickering in the candled dusk. 
Lawford turned his head and saw Sheila’s coiled, 
beautiful hair in the firelight. 

“You have n’t told Alice?” he asked. 

“My dear good man,” said Mr. Bethany, “of 
course we have n’t. You shall tell her yourself on 
Monday. What an incredible tradition it will be 1 
But you must n’t worry; you must n’t even think. 
And no more of these jaunts, eh? That Ferguson 
business — that was too bad. What are we going 
to do with the fellow now we have created him? 
He will come home to roost — ^mark my words; 
and as likely as not down the vicarage chimney. 
I would n’t have believed it of you, my dear fel- 
low ! ” He beamed, but looked, none the less, very 
lean, and fagged, and depressed. 

“How did the wedding go off?” Lawford 
managed to think of inquiring. 

“Oh, Ai,” said Mr. Bethany. “I ’ve just been 
describing it to Alice — the bride, her bridegroom, 
mother, aunts, cake, presents, finery, blushes, 
tears, and everything that was hers. We ’ve been 
in fits, haven’t we, Mrs. Lawford? And Alice 
says I ’m a Worth in a clerical collar — did n’t she? 
And that it ’s only Art that has kept me out of an 
apron. Now look here; quiet, quiet, quiet; no 

7 


98 


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excitement, no pranks. What is there to worry 
about, pray? And now Little Dorrit ’s down with 
influenza too. And Craik and I will have double 
work to do. Well, well ; good bye, my dear. God 
bless you, Lawford. I can’t tell you how relieved, 
how unspeakably relieved I am to find you so much 
— so much better. Feed him up, my dear, d la 
Esquimaux : blubber and weevils ! And there goes 
the bell ! I must have a biscuit. I ’ve swallowed 
nothing but a Cupid in plaster of Paris since 
breakfast. Good night ; we shall miss you both — 
both.” 

But when Sheila returned her husband was sunk 
again into a quiet sleep, from which not even the 
many questions she desired to put to him seemed 
weighty enough to warrant his disturbance. 

So when Lawford again opened his eyes he found 
himself lying wide awake, clear and refreshed, and 
very eager to get up. But upon the air lay the 
still hush of early morning. He tried in vain to 
catch back sleep again. A distant shred of dream 
still floated in his mind, like a cloud at evening. 
He rarely dreamed, but certainly something im- 
mensely interesting had but a moment ago eluded 
him. He sat up and looked at the clear red 
cinders and their maze of grottoes. He got out 
of bed and peeped through the blinds. To the 
east and opposite to him gardens and an apple- 
orchard lay, and there in strange beauty hung the 
morning star, and rose, rilling into the dusk of 


Father and Daughter 


99 


night, the first grey of dawn. The street beneath 
its autumn leaves was vacant, charmed, deserted. 
Hardly since childhood had Lawford seen the 
dawn unless over his winter breakfast-table. Very 
much like a child now he stood gazing out of his 
bow-window — the child whom Time’s busy robins 
had long ago covered over with the leaves of num- 
berless hours. A vague exultation fumed up into 
his brain. Still on the borders of sleep, he un- 
locked the great wardrobe and took out an old 
faded purple and crimson dressing-gown that had 
belonged to his grandfather, the chief glory of 
every Christmas charade. He pulled the cowl- 
like hood over his head and strode majestically 
over to the looking-glass. He looked in there a 
moment on the strange face, like a child dismayed 
at its own excitement, and a fit of sobbing that was 
half uncontrollable laughter swept over him. He 
threw off the hood and turned once more to the 
window. Consciousness had flooded back indeed. 
What would Sheila have said to see him there? 
The unearthly beauty and stillness, and man’s 
small labours, garden and wall and roof -tree, idle 
and smokeless in the light of daybreak — there 
seemed to be some half-told secret between them. 
What had life done with him to leave a reality so 
clouded? He put on his slippers, and, gently 
opening the door, crept with extreme caution up 
the stairs. At a long, narrow landing window he 
confronted a panorama of starry night — gardens, 


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sloping orchards; and beyond them fields, hills, 
Orion, the Dogs, in the clear and cloudless 
darkness. 

God, how beautiful!*’ a voice whispered. 
And a cock crowed mistily out. He stood staring 
like a child into the wintry brightness of a pastry- 
cook’s. Then once more he crept stealthily on. 
He stooped and listened at a closed door, until he 
fancied that above the beating of his own heart 
he could hear the breathing of the sleeper within. 
Then, taking firm hold of the handle with both 
hands, he slowly, noiselessly turned it, and peeped 
in on Alice. The moon was long past her faint 
shining here. The blind was down. And yet it 
was not pitch dark. He stood with eyes fixed, 
waiting. Then he edged softly forward and knelt 
down beside the bed. He could hear {her breathing 
now: long, low, quiet, unhastening — the miracle 
of life. He could just dimly discern the darkness 
of her hair against the pillow. . Some long-sealed 
spring of tenderness seemed to rise in his heart 
with a grief and an ache he had never known 
before. Here, at least, he could find a little peace, 
a brief pause, however futile and stupid all his 
hopes of the night before had been. He leant 
his head on his hands on the counterpane and 
refused to think. He felt a quick tremor, a 
startled movement, and knew that eyes wide 
open with fear were striving to pierce the gloom 
between them. 


Father and Daughter loi 

There, there, dearest,” he said in a low 
whisper, ^‘it ’s only me, only me.” He stroked 
the narrow hand and gazed into the shadowiness. 
Her fingers lay quiet and passive in his, with that 
strange sense of immateriality that sleep brings 
to the body. 

‘‘You, you!” she answered with a deep sigh. 
“Oh, dearest, how you frightened me! What is 
wrong? why have you come? Are you worse, 
dearest, dearest?” 

He kissed her hand. “No, Alice, not worse. I 
could nT sleep, that was all. ” 

“Oh, and I came so utterly miserable to bed, 
because you would not see me. And mother would 
tell me only so very little. I did n’t even know 
you had been ill. ” She pressed his hand between 
her own. “But this, you know, is very, very 
naughty — ^you will take cold. What would she 
say?” 

“ I think we must n’t tell her, dear. I could n’t 
help it; I felt so much I wanted to see you. I 
have been rather miserable, Alice. ” 

“Why?” she said, stroking his hand from wrist 
to finger-tips with one soft finger. “You must n’t 
be miserable. You and I have never done such 
a thing before; have we? Was it that wretched 
old Flu, dear?” 

It was too dark in the little fragrant room even 
to see her face so close to his own. And yet he 
feared. ‘ ‘ Dr. Simon, ’ ’ she went on softly, ‘ ‘ said it 


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was. But is n’t your voice a little hoarse, dear? 
and it sounds so melancholy in the dark. And 
oh ” — she squeezed his wrist — “you have grown so 
thin ! Y ou do frighten me. Whatever should I do 
if you were really ill? And it was so odd, dear. 
When first I woke I seemed to be still straining 
my eyes in a dream, at such a curious, haunting 
face — not very nice. I am glad, I am glad you 
were here.” 

“What was the dream-face like?” came the 
muttered question. 

“Dark and sharp, and rather dwelling eyes; you 
know those long faces one sees in dreams : like a 
hawk, like a conjuror’s.” 

“ Like a conjuror’s ” — it was the first unguarded 
and ungarbled criticism. “Perhaps, dear, if you 
find my voice different, and my hand shrunk up, 
you will find my face changed, too — ^like a con- 
juror’s. . . . What then?” 

She laughed gaily and tenderly. “You silly 
silly! I should love you more than ever. Your 
hands are icy cold. I can’t warm them nohow.” 

Lawford held tight his daughter’s hand. “You 
do love me, Alice? You would not turn against 
me, whatever happened? Ah, you shall see, you 
shall see!” A sudden burning hope sprang up 
in him. Surely when all was well again these 
last few hours would not have been spent in vain. 
Like the shadow of death they had been, against 
whose darkness the green familiar earth seems 


Father and Daughter 


103 


beautiful as the plains of paradise. Had he but 
realised before how much he loved her — what years 
of life had been wasted in leaving it all unsaid! 
He came back from his reverie to find his hand 
wet with her tears. He stroked her hair, and 
touched gently her eyelids without speaking. 

‘‘You will let me come in to-morrow?'’ she 
pleaded; “you won’t keep me out?” 

“Ah, but, dear, you must remember your 
mother. She gets so anxious, and every word the 
doctor says is law. How would you like me to 
come again like this, perhaps; — ^like Santa Claus? ” 

“You know how I love having you,” she said, 
and stopped. “ But — but . . . .” He leaned 
closer. “Yes, yes, come,” she said, clutching his 
hand and hiding her eyes; “it is only my dream — 
that horrible, dwelling face in the dream; it 
frightened me so.” 

Lawford rose very slowly from his knees. He 
could feel in the dark his brows drawn down ; there 
came a low, sullen beating on his ear ; he saw his 
face as it were in dim outline against the dark. 
Rage and rebellion surged up in him ; even his love 
could be turned to bitterness. Well, two could 
play at any game! Alice sprang up in bed and 
caught his sleeve. “Dearest, dearest, you must 
not be angry with me now!” 

He flung himself down beside the bed. Anger, 
resentment died away. “You are all I have left, ’ ’ 
he said. 


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He stole back, as he had come, in the clear dawn, 
to his bedroom. 

It was not yet five. He put a few more coals on 
his fire and blew out the night-light, and lay down. 
But it was impossible to rest, to remain inactive. 
He would go down and search for that first volume 
of Quain. Hallucination, Influenza, Insanity — 
why, Sheila must have purposely mislaid it. A 
rather formidable figure he looked, descending the 
stairs in the grey dusk of dawn. The breakfast- 
room was at the back of the house. He tilted 
the blind, and a faint light flowed in from 
the changing colours of the sky. He opened the 
glass door of the little bookcase to the right of the 
window, and ran eye and finger over the few rows 
of books. But as he stood there with his back 
to the room, just as the shadow of a bird^s wing 
floats across the moonlight of a pool, he became 
suddenly conscious that something, somebody 
had passed across the doorway, and in passing 
had looked in on him. He stood motionless, 
listening; but no sound broke the morning slum- 
brousness, except the far-away warbling of a 
thrush in the first light. So sudden, so transitory 
had been the experience it seemed now to be 
illusory ; yet it had so caught him up, it had with so 
furtive and sinister a quietness broken in on his 
solitude, that for a moment he hesitated to move. 
A cold, indefinite sensation stole over him that he 
was being watched; that some dim, evil presence 


Father and Daughter 105 

was behind him, waiting, patient and expectant, 
with eyes fixed unmovingly on him where he stood. 
But, watch and wait as silently as he might, only 
the day broadened at the window, and at last a 
narrow ray of sunlight stole trembling up into the 
dusky bowl of the sky. / 

At any rate Quain was found, with all the ills of 
life, from A to I ; and Lawford turned back to his 
bondage with the book under his arm. 


CHAPTER VIII 


THE OVERMASTERING DESIRE 

The Sabbath, pale with September sunshine, 
and monotonous with chiming bells, had passed 
languidly away. Dr. Simon had come and gone, 
optimistic and urbane, yet with a faint inward 
dissatisfaction over a patient behind whose 
taciturnity a hint of mockery and subterfuge 
seemed to lurk. Even Mrs. Lawford had ap- 
peared to share her husband’s reticence. But 
Dr. Simon had happened on other cases in his 
experience where tact was required rather than 
skill, and time than medicine. 

The voices and footsteps, even the frou-frou of 
worshippers going to church, the voices and foot- 
steps of worshippers returning from church, had 
floated up to the patient’s open window. Sun- 
light had drawn across his room in one pale beam, 
and vanished. A few people had called. Hot- 
house flowers, waxen and pale, had been left with 
messages of sympathy. Even Mr. Critchett had 
respectfully and discreetly made his inquiries on 
his way home from chapel. 

io6 


The Overmastering Desire 107 

Lawford had spent most of his time in pacing 
to and fro in his soft slippers. The very monotony 
had eased his mind. Now and again he had lain 
motionless, with his face to the ceiling. He had 
dozed and awoke, cold and torpid with dream. He 
had hardly been aware of the process, but every 
hour had done something, it seemed, towards 
clarifying his point of view. A consciousness had 
begun to stir in him that was neither that of 
the old, easy Lawford, whom he had never been 
fully aware of before, nor of this strange, ghostly 
intelligence that haunted the hawklike, restless 
face, and plucked so insistently at his distracted 
nerves. He had begun, in a vague fashion, to be 
aware of them both, could in a fashion discriminate 
between them, almost as if there really were two 
spirits in stubborn conflict within him. It would, 
of course, wear him down in time. There could 
be only one end to such a struggle — the end. 

All day he had longed for freedom, on and on, 
with craving for the open sky, for solitude, for 
green silence, beyond these maddening walls. 
This heedful, silken coming and going, these 
Sunday voices, this reiterant yelp of a single, pee- 
vish bell — would they never cease? And above 
all, betwixt dread and an almost physical greed, 
he hungered for night. He sat down with elbows 
on knees and head on his hands, thinking of night, 
its secrecy, its immeasurable solitude. His eye- 
lids twitched ; the fire before him had for an instant 


io8 


The Return 


gone black out. He seemed to see dark, slow- 
gesturing branches, grass stooping beneath a grey 
and wind-swept sky. He started up; and re- 
membrance of the morning returned to him — the 
glassy light, the changing rays, the beaming gilt 
upon the useless books. Now, at last, at the 
windows, afternoon had begun to wane. And 
when Sheila brought up his tea, as if Chance had 
heard his cry, she entered in hat and stole. She 
put down the tray, and paused at the glass, looking 
across it out of the window. 

“Alice says you are to eat every one of those 
delicious sandwiches, and especially the tiny 
omelette. You have scarcely touched anything 
to-day, Arthur. I am a poor one to preach, I am 
afraid; but you know what that will mean — a 
worse breakdown still. You really must try to 
think of — of us all. ” 

. “Are you going to church?’' he asked in a low 
voice. 

“Not, of course, if you would prefer not. But 
Dr. Simon advised me most particularly to go out 
at least once a day. We must remember, Arthur, 
this is not the beginning of your illness. Long- 
continued anxiety, I suppose, does tell on one in 
time. Anyhow, he said that I looked worried and 
run-down. I am worried. Let us both try for each 
other’s sakes, or even if only for Alice’s, to — to do 
all we can. I must not harass you; but is there 
any — do you see the slightest change of any kind? ” 


The Overmastering Desire 109 

*^You always look pretty, Sheila; to-night you 
look prettier: that is the only change, I think. 

Mrs. Lawford’s attitude intensified in its still- 
ness. '‘Now, speaking quite ‘frankly, what is it 
in you suggests these remarks at such a time? 
That ’s what baffles me. It seems so childish, so 
needlessly blind.” 

“I am very sorry, Sheila, to be so childish. But 
I *m not, say what you like, blind. Y ou are pretty : 
I ’d repeat it if I were burning at the stake.” 

Sheila lowered her eyes softly on to the rich- 
toned picture in the glass. “Supposing,” she 
said, watching her lips move, “supposing — of 
course, I know you are getting better and all that — 
but supposing you don’t change back as Mr. 
Bethany thinks, what will you do? Honestly, 
Arthur, when I think over it calmly, the whole 
tragedy comes back on me with such a 'iv..ce it 
sweeps me off my feet; I am for the moment 
scarcely my own mistress. What would you do ? ” 

“ I think, Sheila, ” replied a low, infinitely weary 
voice, “I think I should marry again.” It was 
the same wavering, faintly ironical voice that 
had slightly discomposed Dr. Simon that same 
morning. 

“ ‘Marry again’!” exclaimed incredulously the 
full lips in the looking glass. ‘ ‘ Who ? ’ ’ 

“You, dear!” Sheila turned softly round, con- 
scious in a most humiliating manner that she had 
ever so little flushed. 


no 


The Return 


Her husband was pouring out his tea, unaware, 
apparently, of her change of position. She 
watched him curiously. In spite of all her reason, 
of her absolute certainty, she wondered for a 
moment if this really could be Arthur. And for 
the first time she realised the power and mastery 
of that eager and far too hungry face. Her mind 
seemed to pause, fluttering in air, like a bird in 
the wind. She hastened rather unsteadily to the 
door. 

“Will you want anything more, do you think, 
for an hour?” she asked. 

Her husband looked up over his little table. 
“Is Alice going with you?” 

“Oh, yes; poor child, she looks so pale and 
miserable. We are going to Mrs. Sherwin’s, and 
then on to church. You will lock your door?” 

“Yes, I will lock my door.” 

“And I do hope, Arthur — nothing rash!” 

A change, that seemed almost the effect of actual 
shadow, came over his face. “I wish you could 
stay with me,” he said slowly. “I don’t think 
you have any idea what — what I go through.” 

It was as if a child had asked on the verge of 
terror for a candle in the dark. But an hour’s 
terror is better than a lifetime of timidity. Sheila 
sighed. 

“I think,” she said, “I, too, might say that. 
But there! giving way will do nothing for either 
of us. I shall be gone only for an hour, or two 


The Overmastering Desire iii 

at the most. And I told Mr. Bethany I should 
have to come out before the sermon: it ’s only 
Mr. Craik.” 

^^But why ‘Mrs. Sherwin’? She’d worm a 
secret out of one’s grave. ” 

“It ’s useless to discuss that, Arthur; you have 
always consistently disliked my friends. It ’s 
scarcely likely that you would find any improve- 
ment in them now. ’’ 

“Oh, well — ” he began. But the door was 
already closed. 

“Sheila!” he called in a burst of anger. 

“Well, Arthur?” 

“You have taken my latchkey.” 

Sheila came hastily in again. “Your latch- 
key?” 

“I am going out.” 

“ ‘Going out’! — ^you will not be so mad, so 
criminal; and after your promise!” 

He stood up. “It is useless to argue. If I do 
not go out, I shall certainly go mad. As for crimi- 
nal — why, that ’s a woman’s word. Who on earth 
is to know me?” 

“ It is of no consequence, then, that the servants 
are already gossiping about this impossible Dr. 
Ferguson; that you are certain to be seen either 
going or returning ; that Alice is bound to discover 
that you are well enough to go out, and yet not 
well enough to say good-night to your own 
daughter? — oh, it ’s monstrous, it ’s a frantic, a 


II2 


The Return 


heartless thing to do!” Her voice vaguely sug- 
gested tears. 

Lawford eyed her coldly and stubbornly — think- 
ing of the empty room he would leave awaiting his 
return, its lamp burning, its firefiames shining. It 
was almost a physical discomfort, this longing un- 
speakable for the twilight, the green secrecy and 
silence of the graves. “Keep them out of the 
way, ” he said in a low voice ; “ it will be dark when 
I come in.” His hardened face lit up. “It’s 
useless to attempt to dissuade me.” 

“Why must you always be hurting me? why do 
you seem to delight in trying to estrange me?” 
Husband and wife faced each other across the 
clearlit room. He did not answer. 

“For the last time,” she said in a quiet, hard 
voice, “I ask you not to go.” 

He shrugged his shoulders. “Ask me not to 
come back, ” he said; “that ’s nearer yotu* hope!” 
and turned his face to the fire. Without moving 
he heard her go out, return, pause, and go out 
again. And when he deliberately wheeled round 
in his chair the little key lay conspicuous there on 
the counterpane. 


CHAPTER IX 


A VISIT TO THE GRAVEYARD 

The last light of sunset lay in the west; a sullen 
wrack of cloud was mounting into the windless sky 
when Lawford entered the little country graveyard 
again by its old weather-worn lych-gate. The 
little old stone church with its square tower stood 
amid trees, its eastern window faintly aglow with 
crimson and purple. He could hear a steady, 
rather nasal voice through its open lattices. But 
the stooping stones and the cypresses were out 
of sight of its porch. He would not be seen down 
there. He paused a moment, however; his hat 
was drawn down over his eyes; he was shivering. 
He looked across and saw far over the harvest 
fields what seemed a growing pallor in the sky. 
He would have the moon to go home by. * ‘ Home ! ’ ’ 
—these trees, this tongueless companionship, this 
heavy, winelike air, this soundless turf — these in 
some obscure desolate fashion seemed far rather 
really home. His eyes wandered towards the 
fading crimson; and with that on his right hand 
he began softly, almost on tiptoe, descending 


II4 


The Return 


the hill. It seemed to him that the steady eyes of 
the dead were watching him in his slow progress. 
The air seemed echoing with little faint, clear calls. 
He turned and snapped his fingers at a robin that 
was stalking him with its stony twittering from 
bush to bush. But when after some little time 
he came out of the narrow avenue and looked 
down, his heart misgave him, for some one was 
already sitting there on his low and solitary seat 
beneath the cypresses. He stood hesitating^ 
looking steadily and yet half vacantly down on the 
motionless figure, and in a while a face was lifted 
in his direction, and undisconcerted eyes calmly 
surveyed him. 

am afraid,’^ began Lawford rather ner- 
vously — “I hope I am not intruding?” 

“Not at all, not at all, ” said the stranger. “I 
have no privileges here; at least as yet. ” 

Lawford again hesitated, then slowly advanced. 
“It ’s astonishingly quiet and beautiful,” he said. 

The stranger turned his head to glance over the 
fields. “Yes, it is, very,” he replied. There was 
the faintest accent, a little drawl of unfriendliness 
in the remark. 

“ You of ten sit here ? ’ ’ Lawford persisted . 

The stranger raised his eyebrows. “Oh, yes, 
often.” He smiled. “It is my own modest 
fashion of attending divine service. The congre- 
gation is rapt.” 

“ikTy visits,” said Lawford, “have been very 


A Visit to the Graveyard 115 

few — in fact, so far as I know, I have only once 
been here before. ” 

“I envy you the novelty.'' There was again 
the same faint, unmistakable antagonism in voice 
and attitude; and yet so deep was the relief in 
talking to one who had n't the least suspicion of 
anything unusual in his appearance, that Law- 
ford was extremely disinclined to turn back. He 
made another effort — for talking to strangers had 
always been something of a difficulty to him — and 
advanced towards the seat. ‘‘You mustn't in- 
deed let me intrude upon you," he said, “but 
really I am very interested in this queer old place. 
Perhaps you would tell me something of its 
history?" He sat down. His companion moved 
slowly to the other side of the broken gravestone. 

“To tell you the truth, " he said, picking his way 
as it were from word to word, “its ‘ history,' as 
people call it, does not interest me in the least. 
After all, it 's not when a thing is, but what it is, 
that much matters. What this is" — he glanced, 
with head bent, across the shadowy stones — “is 
pretty evident. Of course, age has its charms." 

“And is this very old?" 

“Oh, yes, it 's old right enough, as things go; but 
even age, perhaps, is mainly an affair of the imagi- 
nation. There 's a tombstone near that little old 
hawthorn, and there are two others side by side 
under the wall, still even legibly late seventeenth 
century. That's pretty good weathering." He 


ii6 


The Return 


smiled faintly. course, the church itself is 

centuries older, drenched with age. But she ’s 
still sleep-walking while these old tombstones 
dream. Glow-worms and crickets are not such 
bad bedfellows.’’ 

“What interested me most, I think, ” said Law- 
ford haltingly, “was this.’’ He pointed with his 
stick to the grave at his feet. 

“Ah, yes, Sabathier’s,’’ said the stranger; “I 
know his peculiar history almost by heart. ’’ 

Lawford found himself staring with unusual con- 
centration into the rather long, pale face. “Not, 
I suppose, ’’ he resumed faintly — “not, I suppose, 
beyond what ’s there.’’ 

His companion leant his hand on the old stoop- 
ing tombstone. “Well, you know, there’s a 
good deal there” — ^he stooped over — “if you read 
between the lines. Even if you don’t. ” 

“A suicide,” said Lawford, under his breath. 

“Yes, a suicide; that’s why our Christian 
countrymen have buried him outside of the fold. 
Dead or alive, they try to keep the wolf out. ” 

“Is this, then, unconsecrated ground?” said 
Lawford. 

“Haven’t you noticed,” drawled the other, 
“how green the grass grows down here, and 
how very sharp are poor old Sabathier’s thorns? 
Besides, he was a stranger, and they kept him 
out.” 

“But, surely, ” said Lawford, “was it so entirely 


A Visit to the Graveyard 117 

a matter of choice — the laws of the Church? If 
he did kill himself, he did. ” 

The stranger turned with a little shrug. “I 
don’t suppose it ’s a matter of much consequence 
to him. I fancied I was his only friend. May I 
venture to ask why you are so interested in the 
poor old thing?” 

Lawford’s mind was as calm and shallow as a 
millpond. He fidgeted. “Oh, a rather unusual 
thing happened to me here, ” he said. “You say 
you often come?” 

“Often,” said the stranger rather curtly. 

“Has anything — ever — occurred? ” 

“‘Occurred?’” He raised his eyebrows. “I 
wish it had. I come here simply, as I have said, 
because it ’s quiet; because I prefer the company 
of those who never answer one back, and who do 
not so much as condescend to pay me the least 
attention.” He smiled and turned his face 
towards the quiet fields. 

Lawford, after a long pause, lifted his eyes. 
“Do you think, ” he said softly, “it is possible one 
ever could?” 

“ ‘ One ever could? ’ ” 

“Answer back?” 

There was a low rotting wall of stone en- 
compassing Sabathier’s grave; on this the 
stranger sat down. He glanced up rather curi- 
ously at his companion. “Seldom the time and 
the place and the revenant altogether. The 


Ii8 


The Return 


thought has occurred to others,’’ he ventured 
to add. 

“Of course, of course,” said Lawford eagerly. 
“But it is an absolutely new one to me. I don’t 
mean that I have never had such an idea, just in 
one’s own superficial way; but” — he paused and 
glanced swiftly into the fast-thickening twilight — 
“I wonder: are they, do you think, really, all 
quite dead?” 

“Call and see!” said the stranger softly. 

“Ah, yes, I know,” said Lawford. “But I 
believe in the resurrection of the body; that is 
what we say; and supposing, when a man dies — 
supposing it was most frightfully against one’s 
will ; that one hated the awful inaction that death 
brings, shutting a poor devil up like a child kicking 
against the door in a dark cupboard ; one might — 
surely one might — just quietly, you know, try 
to get out? Would n’t you?” he added. 

“And, surely,” he found himself beginning 
gently to argue again, “surely, what about, say, 
him?'" He nodded towards the old and broken 
grave that lay between them. 

“What, Sabathier?” the other echoed, laying 
his hand upon the stone. 

And a sheer enormous abyss of silence seemed 
to follow the unanswerable question. 

“He was a stranger; it says so. Good God!” 
said Lawford, “how he must have wanted to get 
home! He killed himself, poor wretch! think of 


A Visit to the Graveyard 119 

the fret and fever he must have been in — just 
before. Imagine it ! ” 

“But it might, you know,’’ suggested the 
other with a smile — “it might have been sheer 
indifference. ” 

“‘Nicholas Sabathier, Stranger to this parish’ 
— no, no,” said Lawford, his heart beating as 
if it would choke him, “I don’t fancy it was 
indifference. ” 

It was almost too dark now to distinguish the 
stranger’s features, but there seemed a faint sug- 
gestion of irony in his voice. “And how do you 
suppose your angry, naughty child would set 
about it? It ’s narrow quarters; how would he 
begin?” 

Lawford sat quite still. “You say — I hope I 
am not detaining you — ^you say you have come 
here, sat here often, on this very seat; have you 
ever had — ^have you ever fallen asleep here?” 

‘ ‘ Why do you ask ? ” inquired the other curiously. 

“I was only wondering,” said Lawford. He 
was cold and shivering. He felt instinctively it 
was madness to sit on here in this thin, gliding 
mist that had gathered in swathes above the grass, 
milk-pale in the rising moon. The stranger turned 
away from him. 

“‘For in that sleep of death what dreams may 
come must give us pause,’ ” he said slowly, with a 
little satirical catch on the last word. “What did 
you dream?” 


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Lawford glanced helplessly about him. The 
moon cast lean, grey beams of light between the 
cypresses. But to his wide, wandering eyes it 
seemed that a radiance other than hers haunted 
these mounds and leaning stones. ^‘Have you 
ever noticed it?” he said, putting out his hand 
towards his unknown companion; ^‘this stone is 
cracked from head to foot? . . . But there” — he 
rose stiff and chilled — “I am afraid I have bored 
you with my company. You came here for soli- 
tude, and I have been trying to convince you that 
we are surrounded with witnesses. You will 
forgive my intrusion?” There was a kind of old- 
fashioned courtesy in his manner that he himself 
was dimly aware of. He held out his hand. 

hope you will think nothing of the kind,” 
said the other earnestly; ^‘how could it be in any 
sense an intrusion? It ^s the old story of Blue- 
beard. And I confess I should very much like a 
peep into his cupboard too. Who would n’t? 
But there, it ’s merely a matter of time, I sup- 
pose.” He paused, and together they slowly 
ascended the path already glimmering with a 
heavy dew. At the porch they paused once more. 
And now it was the stranger that held out his 
hand. 

'‘Perhaps,” he said, “you will give me the 
pleasure of some day continuing our talk. As for 
our friend below, it so happens that I have man- 
aged to pick up a little more of his history than 


A Visit to the Graveyard 121 

the sexton seems to have known of — you would 
care some time or other to hear it. I live only at 
the foot of the hill, not half a mile distant. Per- 
haps you could spare the time now?” 

Lawford took out his watch. ^‘You are really 
very kind, ” he said. “But, perhaps — well, what- 
ever that history may be, I think you would agree 
that mine is even — but, there, I Ve talked too 
much about myself already. Perhaps to-morrow? ” 

“Why, to-morrow, then,” said his companion. 
“It ’s a flat wooden house, on the left-hand side. 
Come at any time of the evening ” ; he paused again 
and smiled — “the third house after the Rectory, 
which is marked upon the gate. My name is 
Herbert. ” 

Lawford took out his pocket-book and a card. 
“Mine,” he said, handing it gravely to his com- 
panion, “is Lawford — at least. ...” It was 
really the first time that either had seen the other’s 
face, unshadowed and clear-lit ; and on Lawford’s 
a moon almost at the full shone idazzlingly. He 
saw an expression — dismay, incredulity, over- 
whelming astonishment — start suddenly into the 
dark, rather indifferent eyes. 

“What is it?” he cried, hastily stooping close. 

“Why,” said the other, laughing and turning 
away, “I think the moon must have bewitched 
me too. ” 


CHAPTER X 


DOMINATED BY THE INDWELLER 

Lawford listened awhile before opening his door. 
He heard voices in the dining-room. A light shone 
faintly between the blinds of his bedroom. He 
very gently let himself in, and unheard, unseen, 
mounted the stairs. He sat down in front of the 
fire, tired out, and bitterly cold in spite of his 
long walk home. But his mind was wearier even 
than his body. He tried in vain to catch up the 
thread of his thoughts. He only knew for certain 
that so far as his first hope and motives had gone 
his errand had proved entirely futile. ^ ‘ How could 
I possibly fall asleep with that fellow talking 
there?” he had said to himself angrily; yet knew 
in his heart that their talk had driven every other 
idea out of his mind. He had not yet even 
glanced into the glass. His every thought was 
vainly wandering round and round the one curious 
hint that had drifted in, but which he had not yet 
been able to put into words. Supposing, though, 
that he had really fallen into a deep sleep, with 
none to watch or spy — what then? However 
122 


Dominated by the Indweller 123 

ridiculous that idea, it was not more ridiculous, 
more ineredible than the actual fact. He might, 
it was just possible that he would by now have 
actually awakened just his own familiar, every- 
day self again. And the thought of that — though 
he hardly realised its full import — actually did 
send him on tip-toe for a glance that more or less 
effectually set the question at rest. This was 
much the same dark, sallow face that had so much 
appalled him only two nights ago — expressionless, 
cadaverous, with shadowy hollows beneath the 
glittering eyes. And even as he watched it its 
lips, of their own volition, it seemed, drew together 
and questioned him — “ Whose? 

He was not to be given much leisure, however, 
for fantastic reveries like this. As he leaned his 
head on his hands, gladly conscious that he could 
not possibly bear this incessant strain for long, 
Sheila opened the door. He started up. 

‘‘I wish you would knock,’' he said angrily; 
‘‘you talk of quiet; you tell me to rest, and think; 
and here you come creeping and spying on me as if 
I were a child in a nursery. I refuse to be watched 
and guarded and peeped on like this. ” He knew 
that his hands were trembling, that he could not 
keep his eyes fixed, that his voice was nearly 
inarticulate. 

Sheila drew in her lips. “I have merely come 
to tell you, Arthur, that Mr. Bethany has brought 
Mr. Danton in to supper. He agrees with me it 


124 


The Return 


really would be advisable to take such a very old 
and prudent and practical friend into our confi- 
dence. You do nothing I ask of yon. I simply 
cannot bear the burden of this incessant anxiety. 
Look, now, what your night walk has done for 
you! You look positively at death^s door. ” 

What — ^what an instinct you have for the right 
word 1 ” he said softly. ^ ‘ And Danton, of all people 
in the world! It was surely rather a curious, a 
thoughtless choice. Has he had supper?” 

‘‘Why do you ask?” 

“He won’t believe : too — bloated. ” 

“I think,” said Sheila Indignantly, “it is hardly 
fair to speak of a very old and a very true friend 
of mine in such — ^well, vulgar terms as that. Be- 
sides, Arthur, as for believing — without in the 
least desiring to hurt your feelings — I must can- 
didly warn you, some people won’t. ” 

“Come along,” said Lawford, with a faint gust 
of laughter; “let ’s see!” 

They went quickly down-stairs, Sheila with less 
dignity, perhaps, than she had been surprised into 
since she left a slimmer girlhood behind. She 
swept into the gaze of the two gentlemen standing 
together on the hearthrug; and so was caught, as it 
were, between a rain of conflicting glances, for 
her husband had followed instantly, and stood 
now behind her, stooping a little, and with some- 
thing between contempt and defiance confronting 
an old fat friend, whom that one brief challenging 


Dominated by the Indweller 125 

instant had congealed into a condition of passive 
and immovable hostility. 

Mr. Danton composed his chin in his collar, and 
deliberately turned himself a little towards his 
companion. His small eyes wandered a little 
restlessly, and instantaneously met and rested 
on those of Mrs. Lawford. 

^‘Arthur thought he would prefer to come down 
and see you himself. 

“You take such formidable risks, Lawford,” 
said Mr. Bethany in a dry, difficult voice. 

“Am I really to believe — ” he began huskily ; “ I 
am sure, Bethany, you will — My dear Mrs. 
Lawford ! ” said Danton, stirring vaguely, glancing 
restlessly. 

“It was not my wish. Vicar, to come at all,” 
said a voice from the doorway. “To tell you the 
truth, I am too tired to care a jot either way. 
And” — he lifted a long arm — “I must positively 
refuse to produce the least, the remotest proof 
that I am not, so far as I am personally aware, 
even the Man in the Moon. Danton at heart 
was always an incorrigible sceptic. Are n’t you, 
T. D.? You pride your dear old brawn on it in 
secret.” 

“I really — ” began Danton in a rich still 
voice. 

“Oh, but you know you are,” drawled on 
the clear, slightly hesitating long-drawn syllables ; 
“it ’s your parochial metier. Firm, unctuous. 


126 


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subtle scepticism: and to that end your body 
flourishes. You were born fat; you became fat; 
and fat, my dear Danton, has been deliberately 
thrust on you — in layers! Lampreys! You’ll 
perish of surfeit some day, of sheer Dantonism. 
And fat, post mortem, Danton. Oh, what a 
basting ’s there!” 

Mr. Bethany, with a convulsive effort, woke. 
He turned swiftly on Mrs. Lawford. ‘ ‘ Why ! why ! 
could you not have seen? ” he cried. 

^Tt ’s no good. Vicar. She ’s all sheer Laodi- 
cean. Blow hot, blow cold. North, south, east, 
west — to have a weathercock for a wife is to marry 
the wind. There ’s nothing to be got from poor 
Sheila but ...” 

^‘Lawford!” the little man’s voice was as sharp 
as the crack of a whip ; “ I forbid it. Do you hear 
me? I forbid it. Some self-command; my dear 
good fellow, remember, remember it’s only the 
will, the will that keeps us breathing!” 

Lawford peered as if out of a gathering dusk, 
that thickened and flickered with shadows before 
his eyes. “What ’s he mean, then, ” he muttered 
huskily, “coming here with his black, still carcase 
— peeping, peeping — what’s he mean, I say?” 
There was a moment’s silence. Then, with lifted 
brows and wide eyes, that to every one of his 
three witnesses left an indelible memory of clear 
and wolfish light within their glassy pupils, he 
turned heavily, and climbed back to his solitude. 


Dominated by the Indweller 127 

*‘I suppose,” began Danton, with an obvious 
effort to disentangle himself from the humiliation 
of the moment, “I suppose. he was — wandering?” 

“Bless me, yes!” said Mr. Bethany cordially; 
“fever! We all know what that means.” 

“Yes,” said Danton, taking refuge in Mrs. 
Lawford’s white and intent gaze. 

“Just think, think, Danton — the awful, inces- 
sant strain of such an ordeal! Think for an 
instant what such a thing means!'' 

Danton inserted a plump, white finger between 
collar and chin. “Oh, yes! But — eh? — need- 
lessly abusive. I never said I disbelieved him. ” 

“ Do you? ” said Mrs. Lawford’s voice. 

He poised himself, as it were, on the monolithic 
stability of his legs. “Eh?” he said. 

Mr. Bethany sat down at the table. “I rather 
feared some such temporary breakdown as this, 
Danton. I think I foresaw it. And now, just 
while we are all three alone here together in 
friendly conclave, would n’t it be as well, don’t 
you think, to confront ourselves with the difficul- 
ties? I know — we all know, that that poor half- 
demented creature is Arthur Lawford. This 
morning he was as sane, as lucid as I hope I am 
now. This awful calamity has suddenly fallen 
upon him — this change. I own frankly at the 
first sheer shock it staggered me as I think for the 
moment it has staggered you. But when I had 
seen the poor fellow face to' face, heard him talk. 


128 


The Return 


and watched him there, upstairs, in the silence stir 
and awake and come up again to his trouble out 
of his sleep, I had no more doubt in my own mind 
and heart that he was he than I have that I — ^poor 
fool! — am I. We do in some mysterious way, 
you ’ll own at once, grow so accustomed — so 
inured, if you like — to each other’s faces (masks 
though they be) that we hardly realise we see 
them when we are speaking together. And yet 
the slightest, the most infinitesimal change is 
instantly apparent. I have heard Lawford’s own 
account. Conscious or unconscious, he has been 
through some terrific strain, some such awful 
conflict with the unseen powers that we — thank 
God! — ^have only read about, and never, perhaps, 
until death is upon us, shall witness for ourselves. 
What more likely, more inevitable than that such 
a thing should leave its scar, its cloud, its mask- 
ing shadow? — call it what you will. A smile can 
turn a face we dread into a face we’d die for. 
Some experience, which it would be nothing but a 
hideous cruelty and outrage to ask too closely 
about — one, perhaps, which he could, even if he 
would, poor fellow, give no account of — has put 
him temporarily at the world’s mercy — a mere 
nine days’ wonder, a by-word. And that, my dear 
Danton, is just where we come in. We know the 
man himself; and it is to be our privilege to act 
as a buffer- state, to be intermediaries between him 
and the rest of this deadly, craving, sheepish 


Dominated by the Indweller 129 

world — for the time being; oh, yes, just for the 
time being. Other and keener and more know- 
ledgeable minds than mine or yours will some day 
bring him back to us again. We don’t attempt 
to explain; we can’t; we simply believe.” 

But Danton merely continued to stare, as if 
into the quiet of an aquarium. 

“My dear, good Danton,” persisted Mr. 
Bethany with cherubic patience, “how old are 
you?” 

“I don’t see quite — ” smiled Danton with 
recovered ease, and rapidly mobilising forces. 
“Excuse the confidence, Mrs. Lawford, I ’m 
forty-three.” 

“ Good, ” said Mr. Bethany ; “and I ’m seventy- 
one, and this child here” — he pointed an accus- 
ing finger at Sheila — “is youth perpetual. So,” 
he briskly brightened, “say, between us we ’re six 
score all told. Are we — can we, deliberately, 
with this mere pinch of years at our command out 
of the wheeling millions that have gone — can 
we say, ‘ This is impossible,’ to any single phe- 
nomenon? Can we?” 

“No, we can’t, of course,’^ said Danton for- 
midably, “not finally; that’s all very well,” he 
paused, and added, nodding his round head up- 
ward, “I suppose he can’t hear ? ” 

Mr. Bethany rose cheerfully. “All right, Dan- 
ton; I am afraid you are exactly what the poor 
fellow in his delirium solemnly asseverated. 


130 


The Return 


And, jesting apart, it is in delirium that we tell 
our sheer, plain, unadulterated truth : you 're 
a nicely covered sceptic. Personally, I refuse to 
discuss the matter. Mere dull, stubborn pre- 
judice; bigotry, if you like. I will only remark 
just this — that Mrs. Lawford and I, in our inmost 
hearts, know. You, my dear Danton, forgive 
the freedom, merely incredulously grope. Faith 
versus Reason — that prehistoric Armageddon. 
Some day, and a day not far distant either, 
Lawford will come back to us. This — this shutter 
will be taken down as abruptly as by some incon- 
ceivably drowsy heedlessness of common Nature 
it has been put up. He 'll win through ; and of his 
own sheer will and courage. But now, because I 
ask it, and this poor child here entreats it, you will 
say nothing to a living soul about the matter, say, 
till Friday? What step-by-step creatures we are, 
to be sure ! I say Friday because it will be exactly 
a week then. And what 's a week? — to Nature 
scarcely the unfolding of a rose ! But still, Friday 
be it. Then, if nothing has occurred, we will, we 
shall have to call a friendly gathering, we shall 
have to have a friendly consultation. " 

“I'm not, I hope, a brute, Bethany, " said Dan- 
ton apologetically; “but, honestly, speaking for 
myself, simply as a man of the world, it 's a big 
risk to be taking on — what shall we call it? — on 
mere intuition. Personally, and even in a court 
of law — though Heaven forbid it ever reaches that 


Dominated by the Indweller 131 

stage — personally, I could swear that the fellow 
that stood abusing me there, in that revolting 
fashion, was not Lawford. It would be easier 
even to believe in him, if there were not that — 
that glaze, that shocking simulation of the man 
himself, the very man. But then, I am a sceptic ; 
I own it. And ’pon my word, Mrs. Lawford, 
there ’s plenty of room for sceptics in a world 
like this.” 

Very well, ” said Mr. Bethany crisply, ^‘that ’s 
settled, then. With your permission, my dear, ” 
he added, turning untarnishably clear, childlike 
eyes on Sheila, '‘I will take all risks — even to the 
foot of the gibbet: accessory, Danton, after the 
fact.” And so direct and cloudless was his gaze 
that Sheila tried in vain to evade it and to catch a 
glirnpse of Danton’s small, agate-like eyes, now 
completely under mastery, and awaiting con- 
fidently the meeting with her own. 

“Of course,” she said, “I am entirely in your 
hands.” 


CHAPTER XI 


THE HAUNTED HOUSE 

Lawford slept far into the cloudy Monday morn- 
ing, to wake steeped in sleep, lethargic, and fret- 
fully haunted by inconclusive remembrances of 
the night before. When Sheila, with obvious and 
capacious composure, brought him his breakfast 
tray, he watched her face for some time without 
speaking. 

“Sheila,” he began, as she was about to leave 
the room again. 

She paused, smiling. 

“ Did anything happen last night? Would you 
mind telling me, Sheila? Who was it was here?” 

Her lids the least bit narrowed. “Certainly, 
Arthur ; Mr. Danton was here. ” 

“Then it was not a dream?” 

“Oh, no, ” said Sheila. 

“What did I say? What did he say? It was 
hopeless, anyhow.” 

“I don't quite understand what you mean by 
'hopeless,’ Arthur. And must I answer the other 
questions?” 


132 


The Haunted House 


133 


Lawford drew his hand over his face, like a tired 
child. ‘ ‘ He did n’t — believe ? ’ ’ 

“No, dear, ” said Sheila softly. 

“And you, Sheila?’’ came the subdued voice. 

Sheila crossed slowly to the window. “Well, 
quite honestly, Arthur, I was not very surprised. 
Whatever we are agreed about on the whole, you 
were scarcely yourself last night.” 

Lawford shut his eyes, and reopened them full 
on his wife’s calm scrutiny, who had in that mo- 
ment turned in the light of the one drawn blind 
to face him again. 

^ ‘ Who is ? Always ? ’ ’ 

“No,” said Sheila; “but — it was at least un- 
fortunate. We can’t, I suppose, rely on Mr. 
Bethany alone.” 

Lawford crouched over his food. “Will he 
blab?” 

“Blab! Mr. Danton is a gentleman, Arthur.” 

Lawford rolled his eyes as if in temporary 
vertigo. “Yes,” he said. And Sheila once more 
prepared to make a reposeful exit. 

“I don’t think I can see Simon this morning.” 

“Oh! Who, then?” 

“ I mean I would prefer to be left alone. ” 

“Believe me, I had no intention to intrude.” 
And this time the door really closed. 

“He is in a quiet, soothing sleep, ” said Sheila a 
few minutes later. 

“Nothing could be better,” said Dr. Simon; 


134 


The Return 


and Lawford, to his inexpressible relief, heard the 
fevered throbbing of the doctor’s motor-car rearise, 
and turned over and shut his eyes, dulled and 
exhausted in the still unfriendliness of the vacant 
room. His spirits had sunk, he thought, to 
their lowest ebb. He scarcely heeded the frag- 
ments of dreams — clear, green landscapes, amaz- 
ing gleams of peace, the sudden, broken voices, 
the rustling and calling shadowinesses of subcon- 
sciousness in this quiet sunlight of reality. The 
clouds had broken, or had been withdrawn like a 
veil from the October skies. One thought alone 
was his refuge; one face alone haunted him with 
its peace; one remembrance soothed him — ^Alice. 
Through all his scattered and purposeless argu- 
ments he strove to remember her voice, the 
loving-kindness of her eyes, her untroubled 
confidence. 

In the afternoon he got up and dressed himself. 
He could not bring himself to stand before the 
glass and deliberately shave. He even smiled at 
the thought of playing the barber to that lean 
chin. He dressed by the fireplace. 

'T couldn’t rest,” he told Sheila, when she 
presently came in on one of her quiet, cautious, 
heedful visits; “and one tires of reading even 
Quain in bed.” 

“Have you found anything?” she inquired 
politely. 

“Oh, yes, ” said Lawford wearily ; “I have dis- 


The Haunted House 


135 


covered that infinitely worse things are infinitely 
commoner. But there ’s nothing quite so 
picturesque!’’ 

‘^Tell me,” said Sheila, with refreshing naivete, 
^‘How does it feel? does it even in the slightest 
degree affect your mind?” 

He turned his back and looked up at the broad, 
gilt portrait for inspiration. ‘‘Practically, not 
at all,” he said hollowly. “Of course, one’s 
nerves — that fellow Danton — when one ’s over- 
tired. You have” — his voice, in spite of every 
effort, faintly quavered — ^^you haven’t noticed 
anything — my mind?” 

“Me? Oh, dear, no! I never was the least bit 
observant; you know that, Arthur. But apart 
from that, and I hope you will not think me 
unsympathetic — but don’t you think we must 
sooner or later be thinking of what ’s to be done? 
At present, though I fully agree with Mr. Bethany 
as to the wisdom of hushing this unhappy business 
up as long as possible, at least from the gossiping 
outside world, still we are only standing still. And 
your malady, dear, I suppose, is n’t. You will 
help me, Arthur? You will try and think? Poor 
Alice!” 

“What about Alice? ” 

“She mopes, dear, rather. She cannot, of 
course, quite understand why she must not see 
her father, and yet his not being, or, for the matter 
of that, even if he was, at death’s door.” 


1 36 


The Return 


‘‘At death’s door,” murmured Lawford under 
his breath; “who was it was saying that? Have 
you ever, Sheila, in a dream, or just as one’s 
thoughts go sometimes, seen that door? ... its 
ruinous stone lintel, carved into lichenous stone 
heads . . . stonily silent in the last thin sunlight, 
hanging in peace unlatched. Heated, hunted, in 
agony — in that cold, green-clad, shadowed porch 
is haven and sanctuary. ... But beyond — O 
God, beyond!” 

Sheila stood listening with startled eyes. “And 
was all that in Quain?” she inquired rather 
flutteringly. 

Lawford turned a sidelong head, and looked 
steadily at his wife. 

She shook herself, with a slight shiver. “Very 
well, then,” she said and paused in the silence. 

Her husband yawned, and smiled, and almost as 
if lit with that last thin sunshine seemed the smile 
that passed for an instant across the reverie of that 
shadowy face. He drew his hand wearily over his 
eyes. “What has he been saying now?” he said 
like a fretful child. 

Sheila stood very quiet and still, as if in fear of 
scaring some rare, wild, timid creature by the 
least stir. “Who?” she merely breathed. 

Lawford paused on the hearthrug with his 
comb in his hand. “ It ’s just the last rags of that 
beastly influenza, ” he said, and began vigorously 
combing his hair. And yet, simple and frank 


The Haunted House 


137 


though the action was, it moved Sheila, perhaps, 
more than any other of the congested occurrences 
of the last few days. Her forehead grew suddenly 
cold, the palms of her hands began to ache, she 
had to hasten out of the room to avoid revealing 
the sheer physical repulsion she had experienced. 

But Lawford, quite unmindful of the shock, con- 
tinued in a kind of heedless reverie to watch, as it 
were, the still visionary thoughts that passed in 
tranced stillness before his eyes. He longed be- 
yond measure for the freedom that until yesterday 
he had not even dreamed existed outside the 
covers of some old, impossible romance — the 
magic of the darkening sky, the invisible, flocking 
presence of the dead, the shock of imaginations 
that had no words, of quixotic emotions which the 
stranger had stirred in that low, mocking, furtive 
talk beside the broken stones of the Huguenot. 
Was the change’^ quite so monstrous, so mean- 
ingless? How often, indeed, he remembered curi- 
ously, had he seemed to be standing outside these 
fast-shut gates of thought, that now had been 
freely opened to him. 

He opened the door, and leant his ear to listen. 
From far away came a rich, long-continued chuckle 
of laughter, followed by the clatter of a falling 
plate and then, still more uncontrollable laughter. 
There was a faint smell of toast on the air. Law- 
ford ventured out on to the landing and into a little 
room that had once, in years gone by, been Alice’s 


138 


The Return 


nursery. He stood far back, from the strip of 
open window that showed beneath the green 
blind, craning forward to see into the garden — the 
trees, their knotted trunks, and then, as he stole 
nearer, a flower-bed, late roses, geraniums, cal- 
ceolaria, lobelia, the lawn and — ^yes, three wicker 
chairs, a footstool, a work-basket, a little table on 
the smooth, green grass in the honey-coloured sun- 
shine; and Sheila sitting there in the rich sunlight, 
her hands resting on the arms of her chair, her 
head bent, evidently deeply engrossed in her 
thoughts. He crept an inch or two forward, and 
stooped. There was a hat on the grass — ^Alice’s 
big garden hat — and beside it lay Flitters, nose on 
paws, long ears sagging. He had forgotten Flit- 
ters. Had Flitters forgotten him? Would he 
bark at the strange, distasteful scent of a — Dr. 
Ferguson? The coast was clear, then. He turned 
even softlier yet, to confront, rapt, still, and hover- 
ing betwixt astonishment and dread, the blue, 
calm eyes of his daughter, looking in at the door. 
It seemed to Lawford as if they had both been 
suddenly swept by some unseen power into a 
still, unearthly silence. 

“We thought,” he began at last, “we thought 
just to beckon Mrs. Lawford from the window. 
He — he is asleep. ” 

Alice nodded. Her whole face was in a moment 
flooded with red, that ebbed and left her pale. ‘ ‘ I 
will go down and tell mother you want to see her. 


The Haunted House 


139 


It was very silly of me. I did not quite recognise 
at first ... I suppose, thinking of my father 
...” The words faltered, and the eyes were 
lifted to his face again with a desolate, incred- 
ulous appeal. Lawford turned away heartsick 
and trembling. 

Certainly, certainly, by no means,” he began, 
listening vaguely to the glib patter that seemed to 
come from another mouth. ^‘Your father, my 
dear young lady, I venture to think is really on 
the road to recovery. Dr. Simon makes excellent 
progress. But, of course — two heads, we know, 
are so much better than one when there ’s the 
least — the least difficulty. The great thing is 
quiet, rest, isolation, no possibility of a shock, 
else — ” His voice fell away, his eloquence failed. 

For Alice stood gazing stirlessly on and on into 
this infinitely strange, infinitely familiar, shadowy, 
phantasmal face. “Oh, yes, ” she replied, “I quite 
understand, of course; but if I might just peep 
even, it would — I should be so much, much 
happier. Do let me just see him. Dr. Ferguson, 
if only his head on the pillow! I would n’t even 
breathe. Could n’t it, could n’t it possibly help — 
even a faith-cure?” She leant forward impul- 
sively, her voice trembling, and her eyes still 
shining beneath their faint, melancholy smile. 

“I fear, my dear ... it cannot be. He longs 
to see you. But with his mind, you know, in this 
state, it might ” 


140 


The Return 


^‘But mother never told me,” broke in the girl 
desperately, “there was anything wrong with his 
mind. Oh, but that was quite unfair. You don’t 
mean, you don’t mean — that ” 

Lawford scanned swiftly the little square, be- 
loved, and memoried room that fate had suddenly 
converted for him into a cage of unspeakable pain 
and longing. “Oh, no; believe me, no! Not his 
brain, not that, not even wandering; really; but 
always thinking, always longing on and on for 
you, dear, only. Quite, quite master of himself, 
but ” 

“You talk,” she broke in again angrily, “only 
in pretence! You are treating me like a child; 
and so does mother, and so it has been ever since 
I came home. Why, if mother can, and you can, 
why may not I? Why, if he can walk and talk 
in the night . . .” 

“But who — who ^can walk and talk in the 
night’? ” inquired a very low, stealthy voice out 
of the quietness behind her. 

Alice turned quickly. Her mother was standing 
at a little distance, with all the calm and moveless 
concentration of a waxwork figure, looking up at 
her from the staircase. 

“I was — I was talking to Dr. Ferguson, 
mother.” 

“But as I came up the stairs I understood you 
to be inquiring something of Dr. Ferguson, * if,’ 
you were saying, ‘he can walk and talk in the 


The Haunted House 


141 


night’ : you surely were not referring to your father, 
child? That could not possibly be, in his state. 
Dr. Ferguson, I know, will bear me out in that 
at least. And besides, I really must insist on fol- 
lowing out medical directions to the letter. Dr. 
Ferguson, I know, will fully concur. Do, pray. 
Dr. Ferguson,” continued Sheila, raising her 
voice even now scarcely above a rapid murmur, 
^‘do pray assure my daughter that she must have 
patience ; that however much even he himself may 
desire it, it is impossible that she should see her 
father yet. And now, my dear child, come down, 
I want to have a moment’s talk with Dr. Ferguson. 
I feared from his beckoning at the window that 
something was amiss.” 

Alice turned, dismayed, and looked steadily, 
almost with hostility, at the stranger, so curiously 
transfixed and isolated in her small old play-room. 
And in this scornful yet pleading confrontation 
her eye fell suddenly on the pin in his scarf — the 
claw and the pearl she had known all her life. 
From that her gaze fiitted, like some wild, de- 
mented thing’s, over face, hair, hands, clothes, 
attitude, expression, and her heart stood still in 
an awful, inarticulate dread of the unknown. 
She turned slowly towards her mother, groped for- 
ward a few steps, turned once more, stretching 
out her hands towards the vague, still figure 
whose eyes had called so piteously to her out of 
their depths, and fell fainting in the doorway. 


142 


The Return 


Lawford stood motionless, vacantly watching 
Sheila, who knelt, chafing the cold hands. ‘‘She 
has fainted?*’ he said; “oh, Sheila, tell me — only 
fainted?” 

Sheila made no answer; did not even raise her 
eyes. 

“Some day, Sheila — ” he began in a dull 
voice, and broke off, and without another word, 
without even another glance at the still face and 
blue, twitching Hds, he went rapidly out, and in 
another instant Sheila heard the door shut. She 
got up quickly, and after a glance into the bed- 
room locked the door ; then she hastened up-stairs 
for sal volatile and eau de cologne. Alice was 
sitting up when she returned, leaning against the 
empty play-room door, her face hidden in her 
hands. 

It was yet clear daylight when Lawford ap- 
peared beneath the portico of his house. With a 
glance of circumspection that almost seemed to 
suggest a fear of pursuit, he descended the steps, 
only to be made aware in so doing that Ada was 
with a kind of furtive eagerness pointing out the 
mysterious Dr. Ferguson to a steadily gazing 
cook. One or two well-known and many a well- 
remembered face he encountered in the thin 
stream of city men treading blackly along the 
pavement. It was a still evening, and some- 
thing very like a forlorn compassion rose in his 


The Haunted House 


143 


mind at sight of their grave, rather pretentious, 
rather dull, respectable faces. He found himself 
walking with an affectation of effrontery, and 
smiling with a faint contempt on all alike, as if 
to keep himself from slinking, and the wolf out of 
his eyes. He felt restless, and watchful, and 
suspicious, as if he had suddenly come down in 
the world. His, then, was a disguise as effectual 
as a shabby coat and a glazing eye. His heart 
sickened. Was it even worth while living on a 
crust of social respectability so thin and so ex- 
quisitely treacherous? He challenged no one. 
One or two actual acquaintances raised and 
lowered a faintly inquiring eyebrow in his direc- 
tion. One even recalled in his confusion a smile of 
recognition just a moment too late. There was a 
peculiar aura in his presence, a shadow of a some- 
thing in his demeanour that proved him alien. 

None the less, green Widderstone kept calling 
him, much as a bell in the imagination tolls on and 
on, the echo of reality. If the worst should come 
to the worst, why — there is pasture in the solitary 
by-ways for the beast that strays. He quickened 
his pace along lonelier streets, and soon strode 
freely through the little flagged and cobbled 
village of shops, past the same small jutting win- 
dow whose clock had told him the hour on that 
first dark, hurried night. All was pale and faint 
with dying colours now ; and decay was in the leaf, 
and the last swallows filled the gold air with their 


144 


The Return 


clashing stillness. No one heeded him here. He 
looked from side to side, exulting in the strange- 
ness. Shops were left behind, the last milestone 
passed, and in a little while he was walking down- 
hill beneath the elm boughs, which he remembered 
had stood like a turreted wall against the sunset 
when first he had wandered down into the church- 
yard. At the foot of the hill he passed by the 
green and white Rectory, and there was the par- 
son, a little fat, pursy man with wrists protruding 
from his jacket sleeves as he stood on tip-toe, 
tying up a rambling roseshoot on his trim and 
cedared lawn. The next house barely showed its 
old red chimney-tops above its bowers; the next 
was empty, with windows vacantly gazing, its gar- 
den peopled with great bearded weeds that stood 
mutely watching, as it were, the seldom-opened 
gate. Then came more high grandmotherly elms, 
a dense hedge of every leaf that pricks, and then 
Lawford foimd himself standing at the small 
canopied gate of the queer old wooden house that 
the stranger of his talk had in part described. 

It stood square and high and dark in a kind 
of amphitheatre of verdure. Roses here and there 
sprang from the grass, and a narrow box-edged 
path led to a small door, in a kind of low, green- 
mantled wing, with one square window above the 
porch. And as Lawford stood waiting, as one 
stands upon the eve of a new experience, not with- 
out foreboding, he heard as if at a distance the 


The Haunted House 


145 


sound of falling water. He still paused on the 
country roadside, scrutinising this strange, still, 
wooden presence; but at last with an effort he 
pushed open the gate, followed the winding path, 
and pulled the old iron hanging bell. There came 
presently a quiet tread, and Herbert himself 
opened the door which led into a little square 
wood-panelled hall, hung with old prints, and 
portraits in dark frames. 

“Ah, yes, come in, Mr. Lawford,*' he drawled; 
“I was beginning to be afraid you were not 
coming.” 

Lawford laid hat and walking-stick on an old 
bench, and followed his churchyard companion up 
a slightly inclined corridor and a staircase, and so 
into a high room, covered far up the yellowish walls 
with old books on shelves and in cases, between 
which hung in little black frames, mezzotints, 
etchings, and old maps. A large table stood a few 
paces from the deep alcove of the window, which 
was surrounded by a low, faded, green seat, and 
screened from the sunshine by wooden shutters. 
And here the tranquil surge of falling water shook 
incessantly on the air, for the three lower case- 
ments stood open to the fading sunset. On a 
smaller table were spread cups, old earthenware 
dishes of fruit, and a big bowl of damask roses. 

“Please sit down; I sha’n’t be a moment; I am 
not sure that my sister is in; but if so, I will tell 
her we are ready for tea.” Left to himself in 


10 


146 


The Return 


this quiet, strange old room, Lawford forgot for 
a while everything else, he was for the moment so 
taken up with his surroundings. 

What seized his fancy most in this quiet old 
room was this incessant changing roar of fall- 
ing water. It must be the Widder, he said to 
himself, quite close to the walls. But not until 
he had had the boldness to lean head and should- 
ers out of the nearest window did he fully realise 
how close indeed the Widder was. It came 
sweeping, dark and deep, and begreened, full 
with the early autumnal rains, actually against 
the lower walls of the house itself, and in the 
middle suddenly swerved in a black, smooth arch, 
and tumbled headlong into a great pool, nodding 
with tall, slender water-v/eeds, and charged in its 
bubbled blackness here and there with the last 
crimson of the setting sun. To the left of the 
house, where the waters floated free again, stood 
vast, still trees above the clustering rushes ; and in 
glimpses between their spreading boughs lay the 
far-stretching countryside, now dimmed with the 
first mists of approaching evening. So absorbed 
he became as he stood leaning over the wooden sill 
above the falling water, that eye and ear became 
enslaved by the roar and stillness, and in the faint 
atmosphere of age that seemed like a veil to 
hang about the odd old house and these prodigious 
branches, he fell into a kind of waking dream. 

When at last he did draw back into the room it 


The Haunted House 


147 


was perceptibly darker, and a thin, keen shaft of 
recollection struck across his mind — the recollec- 
tion of what he was, and of how he came to be 
there, his reasons for coming and of that dark, 
indefinable presence which, like a raven, had begun 
to build its dwelling in his mind. He sat on, with 
eyes restlessly wandering, his face leaning on his 
hands ; and in a while the door opened and Herbert 
returned, carrying an old crimson and green tea- 
pot and a dish of hot cakes. 

^^They ’re all out,” he said; ^‘sister, Sallie, and 
boy ; but these were in the oven, so we won’t wait. 
I hope you have n’t been very much bored. ” 

Lawford dropped his hands from his face and 
smiled. “I have been looking at the water,” he 
said. 

^‘My sister’s favourite occupation; she sits for 
hours and hours, with not even a book for an 
apology, staring down into the black old roaring 
pot. It has a sort of hypnotic effect after a time. 
And you ’d be surprised how quickly one gets 
used to the noise. To me it ’s even less distract- 
ing than sheer silence. You don’t know, after all, 
what on earth sheer silence means — even at 
Widderstone! But one can just realise a water- 
nymph. They chatter; but, thank Heaven, it ’s 
not articulate. ” He handed Lawford a cup with a 
certain niceness and self-consciousness, lifting his 
eyebrows slightly as he turned. 

Lawford found himself listening out of a peculiar 


148 


The Return 


stillness of mind to the voice of this suave and 
rather inscrutable acquaintance. ‘‘The curious 
thing is, do you know, he began rather nervously, 
“that though I must have passed your gate at 
least twice in the last few months, I have never 
noticed it before, never even caught the sound of 
the water.” 

“No, that ^s the best of it; nobody ever does. 
We are just buried alive. We have lived here for 
years, and scarcely know a soul — not even our own, 
perhaps. Why on earth should one? Acquaint- 
ances, after all, are little else than a bad habit.” 

“But then, what about me? ” said Lawford. 

“But that’s just it,” said Herbert. “I said 
acquaintances; that ’s just exactly what I ’m going 
to prove — ^what very old friends we are. You ’ve 
no idea! It really is rather queer.” He took 
up his cup and sauntered over to the window. 

Lawford eyed him vacantly for a moment, 
and, following rather his own curious thoughts 
than seeking any light on this somewhat vague 
explanation, again broke the silence. “It ’s odd, 
I suppose, but this house affects me much in the 
same way as Widderstone does : I ’m not particu- 
larly fanciful — at least, I used not to be — but 
sitting here I seem, I hope it is n’t a very frantic 
remark, it seems as though, if only my ears would 
let me, I should hear — well, voices. It ’s just 
what you said about the silence. I suppose it ’s 
the age of the place; it is very old?” 


The Haunted House 


149 


“Pretty old, I suppose; it's worm-eaten and 
rat-eaten and tindery enough in all conscience ; and 
the damp does n’t exactly foster it. It ’s a queer 
old shanty. There are two or three accounts of 
it in some old local stuff I have. And of course 
there ’s a ghost. ” 

“A ghost!” echoed Lawford, looking up. 


CHAPTER XII 


REINCARNATION 

What’s in a name?” laughed Herbert. **But 
it really is a queer show-up of human oddity. A 
fellow comes in here, searching; that ’s all”; his 
back was turned, as he stood staring absently out, 
sipping his tea between his sentences; “he comes 
in — oh, it ’s a positive fact, for I Ve seen him my- 
self, just sitting back in my chair here, you know, 
watching him as one would a tramp in one’s 
orchard.” He cast a candid glance over his 
shoulder. “First he looks round, like a prying 
servant. Then he comes cautiously in — a kind 
of grizzled, fawn-coloured face, middle-size, with 
big hands ; and then, just like some quiet, groping, 
nocturnal creature, he begins his precious search — 
shelves, drawers that are not here, cupboards gone 
years ago, questing and nosing no end, and quite 
methodically too, until he reaches the window. 
Then he stops, looks back, narrows his foxy lids, 
listens — quite perceptibly, you know, a kind of 
gingerish blur; then he seems to open this comer 
bookcase here, as if it were a door, and goes out 
150 


Reincarnation 


151 

along what I suppose must at some time have been 
an outside gallery or balcony, unless, as I rather 
fancy, the house extended once beyond these 
windows. Anyhow, out he goes quite deliber- 
ately, treading the air as lightly as Botticelli’s 
angels, until, however far you lean out of the win- 
dow, you can’t follow him any further. And then 
— and this is the bit that takes one’s fancy — 
when you have contentedly noddled down again to 
whatever you may have been doing when the 
wretch appeared, or are sitting in a cold sweat, 
with bolting eyes awaiting developments, just ac- 
cording to your school of thought, or of nerves, 
you know, he comes back — comes back” — ^he 
turned round with a delightfully boyish laugh — 
‘‘comes back, carrying a lighted candle. That 
really is a thrill, I assure you.” 

“But you ’ve seen this — ^you ’ve really seen this 
yourself?” 

“Oh, yes, twice,” replied Herbert cheerfully. 
“And my sister, quite by haphazard, once saw 
him from the garden. She was shelling peas one 
evening for Sallie, and she distinctly saw him 
shamble out of the window here, and go shuffling 
along, mid-air, across the roaring washpot down 
below, turn sharp round the high comer of the 
house, sheer against the stars, in a kind of fright- 
ened hurry. And then, after five minutes’ con- 
centrated watching over the shucks, she saw him 
come shuffling back again — the same distraction, 


152 


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the same nebulous snuff colour, and a candle 
trailing its smoke behind him as he whisked in 
home.” 

“And then?” 

“Ah, then,” said Herbert, lagging along the 
bookshelves, and scanning the book-backs with 
eyes partially closed ; he turned with lifted tea-pot, 
and refilled his visitor’s cup; “then, wherever you 
are — I mean,” he added, cutting up a little cake 
into six neat slices, “wherever the chance inmate of 
the room happens to be, he comes straight for you, 
at a quite alarming velocity, and fades, vanishes, 
melts, or, as it were, silts inside.” 

Lawford listened in a curious hush that had 
suddenly fallen over his mind. “Fades inside? 
silts? — I ’m awfully stupid, but what on earth do 
you mean?” The room had slowly emptied itself 
of daylight ; its own darkness, it seemed, had met 
that of the narrowing night, and Herbert deliber- 
ately lit a cigarette before replying. His clear, 
pale face, with its smooth outline and thin mouth, 
and rather long, dark eyes, turned with a kind of 
serene good-humour towards his questioner. 

“Why,” he said, “I mean frankly just that. 
Besides, it ’s Grisel’s own phrase; and an old nurse 
we used to have said much the same. He comes, 
or it comes towards you, first just walking, then 
with a kind of gradually accelerated slide or glide, 
and sweeps straight into you,” he tapped his 
chest, “me, whoever it may be is here, in a kind 


Reincarnation 153 

of panic, I suppose, to hide, or perhaps simply to 
get back again.” 

“Get back where?” 

“Be resumed, as it were, vid you. You see, I 
suppose he is compelled to regain his circle, or 
Purgatory, or Styx, whatever you like to call it, 
vid consciousness. No one present, then no 
revenant or spook, or astral body, or hallucination : 
what ’s in a name? And, of course, even an 
hallucination is mind-stuff, and on its own, as it 
were. What I mean is that the poor devil must 
have some kind of human personality to get back 
through in order to make his exit from our sphere 
of consciousness into his. And of course, of 
course, to make his entrance too. If like a tenu- 
ous smoke he can get in, the probability is that 
he gets out in precisely the same fashion. For 
really, if you were n’t consciously expecting a 
quite terrific impact (you actually jerk forward in 
the act of resistance unresisted), you would not 
notice his going. I am afraid I must be horribly 
boring you with all these tangled theories. All I 
mean is, that if you were really absorbed in what 
you happened to be doing at the time, the thing 
might come and go, with your mind for entrance 
and exit, as it were, without your being conscious 
of it at all. ” There was a longish pause, in which 
Herbert slowly inhaled and softly breathed out 
his smoke. 

“And what — what ’s the poor wretch searching 


154 


The Return 


for? And what — why, what becomes of him when 
he does go?” 

“Ah, there you have me ! One merely surmises 
just as one’s temperament or convictions lean. 
Grisel says it ’s some poor derelict soul in search 
of peace — that the poor beggar wants finally to 
die, in fact, and can’t. Sallie smells crime. After 
all, what is every man?” he talked on; “a horde 
of ghosts — like a Chinese nest of boxes — oaks that 
were acorns that were oaks. Death lies behind us, 
not in front — in our ancestors, back and back, 
until ” 

“‘Until’? ” Lawf or d managed to remark. 

“Ah, that settles me again. Don’t they call it 
an amoeba? But really I am abjectly ignorant 
of all that kind of stuff. We are all we are, and 
all in a sense we care to dream we are. And 
for that matter, anything outlandish, bizarre, is a 
godsend in this rather stodgy life. It is after all 
just what the old boy said — ^it ’s only the impos- 
sible that ’s credible: whatever credible may 
mean. ...” 

It seemed to Lawford as if the last remark 
had wafted him bodily into the presence of his 
kind, blinking, intensely anxious old friend, Mr. 
Bethany. And what leagues asunder the two 
men were who had happened on much the same 
words to paint their convictions ! 

He drew his hand gropingly over his face, half 
rose, and again seated himself. “Whatever it 


Reincarnation 


155 


may be,’* he said, ^‘the whole thing reminds me, 
you know — it is in a way so curiously like my 
own — ^my own case. ” 

Herbert sat on, a little drawn up in his chair, 
quietly smoking. The crash of the falling water, 
after seeming to increase in volume with the fading 
of evening, had again died down in the darkness 
to a low, multitudinous tumult as of countless 
inarticulate, echoing voices. 

Bizarre,’ you said: God knows I am.” But 
Herbert still remained obdurately silent. ‘^You 
remember, perhaps,” Lawford faintly began 
again, ^‘our talk the other night?” 

Oh, rather, ” replied the cordial voice out of the 
dusk. 

”I suppose you thought I was insane?” 

* ‘Insane!” There was a genuinely amused as- 
tonishment in the echo. “You were lucidity it- 
self. Besides — well, honestly, if I may venture, I 
don’t put very much truck in what one calls one’s 
sanity : except, of course, as a bond of respectability 
and a means of livelihood. ” 

“But did you realise in the least from what I said 
how I really stand? That I went down into that 
old shadowy hollow one man, and came back — 
well — this?” 

“I gathered vaguely something like that. I 
thought at first it was merely an affectation — that 
what you said was an affectation, I mean — until — 
well, to be quite frank it was the ‘ this ’ that so 


The Return 


156 

immensely interested me. Especially,” he added 
almost with a touch of gaiety, ^‘especially the last 
glimpse. But if it ’s really not a forbidden ques- 
tion, what precisely was the other? What pre- 
cise manner of man, I mean, came down into 
Widderstone? ” 

“ It is my face that is changed, Mr. Herbert. If 
you ’ll try to understand me — ^my face. What 
you see now is not what I really am, not what I 
was. Oh, it is all quite different — I know per- 
fectly well how — how absurd it must sound. You 
won’t press me further. But that ’s the truth : 
that ’s what they have done for me. ” 

It seemed to Lawford as if a remote tiny shout of 
laughter had been suddenly caught back in the 
silence that had followed his confession. He 
peered in vain in the direction of his companion. 
Even his cigarette revealed no sign of him. “I 
know, I know,” he went gropingly on; “I felt it 
would sound to you like nothing but frantic, 
incredible nonsense. You can’t see it. You can’t 
feel it. You can’t hear these hooting voices. 
It ’s no use at all blinking the fact; I am simply 
on the verge, if not over it, of insanity.” 

“As to that, Mr. Lawford, honestly, the very 
fact of your being able to say so seems to me all 
but proof positive that you ’re not. Insanity is on 
another plane, is n’t it? in which one can’t compare 
one’s states. As for what you say being credible, 
take our precious noodle of a spook here ! Ninety- 


Reincarnation 


157 


nine hundredths of this amiable world of ours 
would have guffawed the poor creature into im- 
perceptibility ages ago. To such poor credulous 
creatures as my sister and me he is no more and no 
less a fact, a personality, a jolly reality than — well, 
this teacup. Here we are, amazing mysteries both 
of us in any case; and all round us are scores of 
books, dealing just with life, pure, candid, and 
undefiled; and there ’s not a single one among 
them but reads like a taradiddle. Yet grope be- 
tween the lines of any autobiography, it 's pretty 
clear what one has got, — a feeble, timid, creeping 
attempt to describe the indescribable. As for 
what you say your case is, the bizarre — that kind 
very seldom gets into print at all. In all this 
make-believe, all this pretence, how, honestly, 
could it? But there, this is all immaterial. The 
real question is, may I, can I help? What I 
gather is this: You just trundled down into 
Widderstone all among the dead men — but one 
moment, I '11 light up. " He struck a match, and 
shading it in his hand from the night air straying 
through the open window, lit the two candles 
that stood upon the little chimney-piece behind 
Lawford’s head. Then sauntering over to the 
window again, almost as if with an affectation of 
nonchalance, he drew one of the shutters, and sat 
down. ^‘Nothing much struck me,” he went on, 
leaning back on his hands, “I mean on Sunday 
evening, until you said good-bye. It was when I 


158 


The Return 


caught in the moon a distinct glimpse of your 

facer 

“This/' said Lawford, with a sudden horrible 
sinking of the heart. 

Herbert nodded. “The fact is, I have a print 
of it, " he said. 

“A print of it?” 

“A miserable little dingy engraving.” 

“Of this?” Herbert nodded, with eyes fixed. 
“Where?” 

“That 's the nuisance! I searched high and low 
for it the instant I got home. For the moment 
it has been mislaid; but it must be somewhere 
in the house, and will turn up all in good time. 
It 's the frontispiece of one of a little old French 
collection of pamphlets, sewn up together quite 
amateurishly in a marbled paper cover — con- 
fessions, travels, trials — all eighteenth century, 
and all in French. ” 

“And mine?” said Lawford, gazing stonily 
across the candle-light. 

Herbert, from a head slightly stooping, gazed 
back in an almost birdlike fashion across the room 
at his visitor. 

“ Sabathier's, ” he said. 

“ Sabathier’s 1 ” 

“An extraordinary resemblance. Of course, I 
am speaking only from memory; and perhaps it ’s 
not quite so vivid in this light; but still aston- 
ishingly clear.” 


Reincarnation 


159 


Lawford sat drawn up, staring at his compan- 
ion’s face in an intense and helpless silence. His 
mouth opened but no words came. 

*‘Of course, ” began Herbert again, don’t say 
there ’s anything in it — except just the — the 
coincidence.” He paused and glanced out of the 
open casement beside him. “But there ’s just one 
obvious question. Do you happen to know of 
any strain of French blood in your family?” 

Lawford shut his eyes. Even memory seemed to 
be forsaking him at last. “No,” he said, after a 
long pause, “there ’s a little Dutch, I think, on my 
mother’s side, but no French. ” 

“No Sabathier, then?” said Herbert, smiling. 
“And then there ’s another question — this change; 
is it really as complete as you suppose? Has it — 
please just warn me off if I am in the least intruding 
— ^hasit been noticed?” 

[ Lawford hesitated. “Oh, yes,” he said slowly, 
“it has been noticed — my wife, a few friends.” 

“Do you mind this infernal clatter?” said 
Herbert, laying his fingers on the open casement. 

“No, no,’* said Lawford; “and you think?” 

“My dear fellow, I don’t think anything. It ’s 
all craziest conjecture. Stranger things even than 
this have happened. There are dozens here — in 
print. What are we human beings after all? 
Clay in the hands of the potter. Our bodies are 
merely an inheritance, packed tight and corded 
up. We have practically no control over their 


i6o 


The Return 


main functions. We can't even replace a little 
finger-nail. And look at the faces of us — what 
atrocious mockeries most of them are of any 
kind of image! But we know our bodies change 
— age, sickness, thought, passion, fatality. It 
proves ]they are amazingly plastic. And even 
merely as a theory it is not in the least unten- 
able that, by force of some violent convulsive 
effort from outside, one’s body might change. 
... It answers with odd voluntariness to friend 
or foe, smile or snarl. As for what we call the 
laws of Nature, they are pure assumptions to- 
day, and may be nothing better than scrap-iron 
to-morrow. Good Heavens, Lawford, consider 
man’s abysmal impudence!” He smoked on in 
silence for a moment. ^‘You say you fell asleep 
down there? ” 

Lawford nodded. Herbert tapped his cigarette 
on the sill. ^‘Just following up our conjecture,” 
he said musingly, ‘‘it wasn’t such a bad oppor- 
tunity for the poor chap.” 

“But surely, ” said Lawford, speaking as it were 
out of a dream of candle-light, and murmurous 
sound, and clearest darkness, towards this strange, 
deliberate phantom with the unruffled, clear-cut 
features — “surely then, in that case, he is here 
now? And yet, on my word of honour, though 
every friend I ever had in the world should deny 
it, I am the same; memory stretches back clear 
and sound to my childhood ; I can see myself with 


Reincarnation 


i6i 


extraordinary lucidity, how I think, my motives, 
and all that; and in spite of these voices that I 
seem to hear, and this peculiar kind of longing to 
break away, as it were, just to press on — it is I, 
I myself, that am speaking to you now out of this 
— this mask.” 

Herbert glanced reflectively at his companion. 
‘‘You mustn’t let me tire you,” he said; “but 
even on our theory it would not necessarily follow 
that you yourself would be much affected. It ’s 
true this fellow Sabathier really was something 
of a personality. He had a most wonderful itch 
for life, for trying on and on to squeeze something 
out of experience that is n’t there ; and he never 
seemed to weary of a magniflcent attempt to 
find in his fellow-creatures, especially the women 
he met, what even if they have they cannot give. 
The little book I wanted to show you is partly 
autobiographical and really does manage to set 
the fellow on his feet. Even there he does ab- 
solutely take one’s imagination. I shall never 
forget the thrill of picking him up in the Charing 
Cross Road. You see, I had known the queer old 
tombstone for years. He ’s enormously vivid — 
quite beyond my feebleness to describe, with a 
kind of French verve and rapture. Unluckily 
we can’t get nearer than two years to his death. I 
should n’t mind guessing some last devastating 
dream swept over him, held him the breath of an 
instant too long beneath the wave, and he caved 


II 


i 62 


The Return 


in. We know he did kill himself; and, perhaps, 
died to regret it ever after.” 

After all, what is this precious dying we talk so 
much about?” Herbert continued after a while, 
his eyes restlessly wandering from shelf to shelf. 

You remember our talk in the churchyard? We 
all know that the body fades quick enough when 
its occupant is gone. Supposing even in the sleep 
of the living it lies very feebly guarded. And 
supposing in that state some infernally potent 
thing outside it, wandering disembodied, just hap- 
pens on it — like some hungry sexton beetle on the 
body of a mouse. Supposing — I know it ’ s the 
most outrageous theorising — but supposing all 
these years of sun and dark, Sabathier’s emana- 
tion, or whatever you like to call it, horribly rest- 
less, by some fatality longing on and on just for 
life, or even for the face, the voice, of some 
^ impossible she* whom he could n’t get in life, 
simply loathing all else; supposing he has been 
lingering in ambush down beside those poor old 
dusty bones that had poured out for him such 
marrowy hospitality — oh, I know it.; the dead 
do. And then, just by chance, one quiet autumn 
evening, a veritable godsend of a little Miss Muffet 
comes wandering down under the shade of his 
immortal cypresses, half asleep, fagged out, de- 
pressed mind and body, perhaps : imagine your- 
self in his place, and he in yours ! ” Herbert stood 
up in his eagerness, his sleek hair shining. “The 


Reincarnation 


163 

one clinching chance of a century! Wouldn’t 
you have made a fight for it? Would n’t you 
have risked the raid? I can just conceive it — 
the amazing struggle in that darkness within a 
darkness; like some dazed alien bee bursting 
through the sentinels of a hive; one mad impetuous 
clutch at victory; then the appalling stirring on 
the other side; the groping back to a house dis- 
mantled, rearranged, not, mind you, disorganised 
or disintegrated ...” He broke off with a 
smile, as if of apology for this long, fantastic 
harangue. 

Lawf ord sat listening, his eyes fixed on Herbert’s 
colourless face. There was not a sound else, it 
seemed, than that slightly drawling, scrupulous 
voice poking its way amid a maze of enticing, 
baffling thoughts. Herbert turned away with a 
shrug. ^‘It ’s tempting stuff,” he said, choosing 
another cigarette. “But anyhow, the poor 
beggar failed.” 

“Failed!” 

“Why, surely; if he had succeeded I should not 
now be talking to a mere imperfect simulacrum, to 
the outward illusion of a passing likeness to the 
man, but to Sabathier himself ! ” His eyes moved 
slowly round and dwelt for a moment with a dark, 
quiet scrutiny on his visitor. 

“You say a passing likeness; do you mean 
that?” 

Herbert smiled indulgently. “If one can mean 


164 


The Return 


what is purely a speculation. I am only trying to 
look at the thing dispassionately, you see. We are 
so much the slaves of mere repetition. Here is 
life — ^yours and mine — a kind of plenum in vacuo. 
It is only when we begin to play the eavesdropper ; 
when something goes askew; when one of the 
sentries on the frontier of the unexpected shouts 
a hoarse ‘ Qui vive ? ’ that we begin to question ; to 
prick our aldermen and pinch the calves of our 
kings. Why, who is there can answer to any- 
body’s but his own satisfaction, just that one 
fimdamental question — ^Are we the prisoners, the 
slaves, the inheritors, the creatures, or the crea- 
tors of our bodies? Fallen angels or horrific dust? 
As for identity, or likeness, or personality, we have 
only our neighbours’ nod for them, and just a 
fading memory. No, the old fairy tales knew 
better ; and witchcraft ’s witchcraft to the end of 
the chapter. Honestly, and just of course on that 
one theory, Lawford, I can’t help thinking that 
Sabathier’s raid only just so far succeeded as to 
leave his impression in the wax. It does n’t, of 
course, follow that it will necessarily end there. 
It might — it may be even now just gradually fad- 
ing away. It may, you know, need driving out — 
with whips and scorpions. It might, perhaps, 
work in.” 

Lawford sat cold and still. ‘Tt ’s no good, no 
good, ” he said, ‘T don’t understand; I can’t follow 
you. I was always stupid, always bigoted and 


Reincarnation 


165 


cocksure. These things have always seemed noth- 
ing but old women’s tales to me. And now I must 
pay for it. And this Nicholas Sabathier; you say 
he was a blackguard?” 

“Well,” said Herbert with a faint smile, “that 
depends on your definition of the word. He 
was n’t a flunkey, a fool, or a prig, if that ’s what 
you mean. He was n’t perhaps on Mrs. Grundy’s 
visiting list. He was n’t exactly gregarious. 
And yet in a sense that kind of temperament ’s 
so rare that Sappho, Nelson, and Shelley shared it. 
To the stodgy, suety world of course it ’s little 
else than sheer moonshine, midsummer madness. 
Naturally, in its own charming, stodgy way the 
world kept flicking cold water in his direction. 
Naturally it hissed. ... I shall find the book. 
You shall have the book; oh, yes.” 

“There ’s only one more question,” said Law- 
ford in a dull, slow voice, stooping and covering 
his face with his hands. “I know it ’s impossible 
for you to realise — but to me time seems like that 
water there, to be heaping up about me. I wait, 
just as one waits when the conductor of an orches- 
tra lifts his hand and in a moment the whole surge 
of brass and wood, cymbal and drum will crash 
out — and sweep me under. I can’t tell you, 
Herbert, how it all is, with just these groping 
stirrings of that mole in my mind’s dark. You 
say it ’s just this face — working in. God knows. 
I find it easy to speak to you — this cold, clear 


i66 


The Return 


sense, you know. The others feel too much, or 
are afraid, or — Let me think — ^yes, I was going to 
ask you a question. But no one can answer it.*’ 
He peered darkly, with white face suddenly 
revealed between his hands. ^‘What remains 
now? Where do I come in? What is there left 
for me to do?” 

And at that moment there fell the sound, even 
above the gushing of the water beneath, of a light 
footfall approaching along the corridor. 

'‘Listen,” said Herbert; “here’s my sister 
coming; we ’ll ask her. ” 


CHAPTER XIII 


WINNING THROUGH 

The door opened. Lawford rose, and into the 
further rays of the candle-light entered a rather 
slim figure in a light summer gown. 

Just home?’' said Herbert. 

^‘We ’ve been for a walk ” 

^‘My sister always forgets everything,” said 
Herbert, turning to Lawford; *‘even tea-time. 
This is Mr. Lawford, Grisel. We ’ve been argu- 
ing no end. And we want you to give a decision. 
It’s just this: Supposing if by some impossible 
trick you had come in now, not the charming, 
familiar sister you are, but shorter, fatter, fair 
and round-faced, quite different, physically, you 
know — ^what would you do?” 

^^What nonsense you talk, Herbert!” 

^‘Yes, but supposing: a complete transmogri- 
fication — by some unimaginable ingression or 
enchantment, by nibbling a bunch of roses, or 
whatever you like to call it?” 

Only physically?” 

“Well, yes, actually; but potentially, why — 
that ’s another matter. ” 


167 


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1 68 

The dark eyes passed slowly from her brother’s 
face and rested gravely on their visitor’s. 

‘‘Is he making fun of me?” 

Lawford almost imperceptibly shook his head. 

“But what a question! And I’ve had no tea.” 
She drew her gloves slowly through her hand. 
“The thing, of course, isn’t possible, I know. 
But should n’t I go mad, don’t you think?” 

Lawford gazed quietly back into her clear, 
grave, deliberate eyes. “Suppose, suppose, just 
for the sake of argument — not,"' he suggested. 

She turned her head and reflected, glancing 
from one to the other of the pure, steady candle- 
flames. 

“And what was your answer?” she said, looking 
over her shoulder at her brother. 

“My dear child, you know what my answers 
are like!” 

“And yours?” 

Lawford took a deep breath, gazing mutely, 
forlornly, into the lovely, untroubled peace of her 
eyes, and without the least warning tears swept 
up into his own. With an immense effort he 
turned, and choking back every sound, beating 
back every thought, groped his way towards the 
square, black darkness of the open door. 

“I must think, I must think,” he managed to 
whisper, lifting his hand and steadying himself. 
He caught over his shoulder the glimpse of a 
curiously distorted vision, a lifted candle, and a 


Winning Through 169 

still face gazing after him with infinitely grieved 
eyes, then found himself groping and stumbling 
down the steep, uneven staircase into the darkness 
of the queer old wooden and hushed and lonely 
house. The night air cold on his face calmed his 
mind. He turned and held out his hand. 

You ’ll come again, ” Herbert was saying with 
a hint of anxiety, even of apology in his voice. 

Lawford nodded with eyes fixed blankly on the 
candle, and turning once more, made his way 
slowly down the narrow, green-bordered path 
upon which the stars rained scattered light so 
feeble it seeemd but as a haze that blurred the 
darkness. He pushed open the little white 
wicket and turned his face towards the soundless, 
leaf-crowned hill. He had advanced hardly a 
score of steps in the thick dust when almost as if 
its very silence had struck upon his ear he remem- 
bered the black, broken grave with its sightless 
heads that lay beyond the leaves. And fear, 
vast and menacing, fear such as only children 
know, broke like a . sea of darkness on his heart. 
He stopped dead — cold, helpless, and trembling. 
And in the silence he heard a faint cry behind 
him and light footsteps pursuing him. He turned 
again. In the thick, close gloom beneath the 
enormous elm-boughs the grey eyes shone clearly 
visible in the face upturned to him. ^‘My 
brother,” she began breathlessly — '‘the little 
French book. It was I who mislaid it. ” 


170 


The Return 


The set, stricken face listened unmoved. 

“You are ill. Comeback! I am afraid you are 
very ill.’' 

“It ’s not that, not that,” Lawford muttered; 
“don’t leave me; I am alone. Don’t question 
me,” he said with a sob, looking down into her 
face, clutching her hand; “only understand that I 
can’t, I can’t go on.” He swept a lean arm to- 
wards the unseen churchyard. “I am afraid.” 

The cold hand clasped his closer. “Hush, 
don’t speak! Come back; come back! I am with 
you, a friend, you see; come back!” 

Lawford clutched her hand as a blind man in 
sudden peril might clutch the hand of a child. He 
saw nothing clearly ; spoke almost without under- 
standing his words. ‘ ‘ Oh, but it ’s musty ’ ’ he said ; 
“I must go on. You see — why, everything de- 
pends on struggling through: the future! But if 
you only knew — There ! ” Again his arm swept 
out, and the lean, terrified face turned shuddering 
from the dark. 

“I do know; believe me, believe me! I can 
guess. See, I am coming with you; we will go 
together. As if, as if I did not know what it is to 
be afraid! Oh, believe me; no one is near; we go 
on; and see! it gradually, gradually lightens. 
How glad I am I came!” 

She had turned and they were steadily ascend- 
ing as if pushing their way, battling on through 
some obstacle of the mind rather than of the senses 


Winning Through 17 1 

beneath the star-powdered, callous vault of night. 
And it seemed to Lawford as if, as they pressed 
on together, some obscure, detestable presence as 
slowly, as doggedly had drawn worsted aside. He 
could see again the peaceful outspread branches 
of the trees, the lych-gate standing in clear-cut 
silhouette against the liquid dusk of the sky. A 
strange calm stole over his mind. The very 
meaning and memory of his fear faded out and 
vanished, as the passed-away clouds of a storm 
that leave a purer, serener sky. 

They stopped and stood together on the brow 
of the little hill, and Lawford, still trembling from 
head to foot, looked back across the hushed and 
lightless countryside. “It’s all gone now,” he 
said wearily, “and now there ’s nothing left. 
You see, I cannot even ask your forgiveness — 
and a stranger!” 

“Please don’t say that — ^unless — ^unless — 
pilgrim’ too. I think, surely, you must own we 
did have the best of it that time. Yes — and I 
don’t care who may be listening 1 — but we did win 
through!” 

“What can I say? How shall I explain? How 
shall I make you understand?” 

The clear grey eyes showed not the faintest 
perturbation. “But I do; I do indeed, in part; 
I do understand, ever so faintly.” 

“And now I will come back with you. ” 

They paused in the darkness face to face, the 


172 


The Return 


silence of the sky, arched in its vastness above the 
little hill, the only witness of their triumph. 

She turned unquestioningly. And laughing 
softly — almost as children do, the stalking 
shadows of a twilight wood behind them — they 
trod in silence back to the house. They said good- 
bye at the gate and Lawford started once more for 
home. He walked slowly, conscious of an almost 
intolerable weariness, as if his strength had sud- 
denly been wrested away from him. And at the 
top of the hill he sat down on the bank beside a 
nettled ditch, beneath a bush of purple-berried 
nightshade, and with his book pressed down upon 
the wayside grass struck a match, and holding it 
low in the scented, windless air turned slowly the 
cockled pages. 

Few of them were alike except for the dinginess 
of the print and the sinister smudge of the por- 
traits. All were sewn roughly together into a 
mould-stained, marbled cover. He lit a second 
match, and as he did so glanced as if inquiringly 
over his shoulder. And a score or so of pages 
before the end he came at last upon the name he 
was seeking, and turned the page. 

It was a likeness even more striking in its crude- 
ness of ink and line and paper than the most 
finished of portraits could have been. It repelled, 
and yet it fascinated him. He had not for a 
moment doubted Herbert’s calm conviction. And 
yet as he stooped in the grass, closely scrutinising 


Winning Through 173 

the blurred, obscure features, he felt the faintest 
surprise not so much at the significant resemblance 
but at his own composure, his own steady, un- 
flinching confrontation with this sinister and 
intangible adversary. The match burned down 
to his fingers. It hissed faintly in the grass. 

He stuffed the book into his pocket, and stared 
into the pale dial of his watch. It was a few 
minutes after eleven. Midnight, then, would 
just see him in. He rose stiffly and yawned in 
sheer exhaustion. Then, hesitating, he turned 
his head and looked down towards the hollow. 
But a vague foreboding held him back. A souj* 
and vacuous incredulity swept over him. What 
was the use of all this struggling and vexation? 
What gain in living on? Once dead his sluggish 
spirit at least would find its rest. Dust to dust 
indeed it would be for him. What else, in sober 
earnest, had he been all his daily stolid life but 
half dead, scarce conscious, without a living 
thought, or desire, in head or heart? 

And even while he was still gloomily debating 
within himself he had turned towards home, and 
soon was walking in a kind of reverie, even his 
extreme tiredness in part forgotten, and only a far- 
away, dogged recollection in his mind that in spite 
of shame, in spite of all his miserable weakness, 
the words had been once for all uttered, and in all 
sincerity, “We did win through!'’ 

Yet a desolate and odd air of strangeness seemed 


174 


The Return 


to drape his unlighted house as he stood looking 
up in a kind of furtive communion with its win- 
dows. It affected him with that discomforting 
air of extreme and meaningless novelty that things 
very familiar sometimes take upon themselves. 
In this leaden tiredness no impression could be 
trustworthy. His lids shut of themselves as he 
softly moimted the steps. It seemed so needlessly 
wide a door that soimdlessly admitted him. But 
however hard he pressed the key his bedroom 
door remained stubbornly shut luitil he found that 
it was already unlocked and he had only to turn 
the handle. A night-light burned in a little basin 
on the washstand. The room was hung, as it 
were, with the stillness of night. And half lying 
on the bed in her dressing-gown, her head leaning 
on the rail at the foot, was Alice, just as sleep had 
overtaken her. 

Lawford returned to the door and listened. It 
seemed he heard a voice talking downstairs, and 
yet not talking, for it ran on and on in an incessant 
slightly argumentative monotony that had neither 
break nor interruption. He closed the door, and 
stooping laid his hand softly on Alice’s narrow, 
still childish hand that lay half -folded on her knee. 
Her eyes opened instantly and gazed widely into 
his face. A slow, vacant smile of sleep came and 
went and her fingers tightened gently over his 
as again her lids drooped down over the drowsy 
blue eyes. 


Winning Through 175 

last, at last, dear,^’ she said; have been 
waiting such a time. But we must n't talk much. 
Mother is waiting up, reading." 

Faintly through the close-shut door came the 
soimd of that distant, expressionless voice mono- 
tonously rising and falling. 

‘‘Why didn’t you tell me, dear?" Alice still 
sleepily whispered. “Would I have asked a 
single question? How could I? Oh, if you had 
only trusted me!" 

“But the change — the change, Alice! You 
must have seen that. You spoke to me, you did 
think I was only a — a stranger; and even when you 
knew, it was only fear on your face, dearest, and 
'aversion; and you turned to your mother first. 
Don’t think, Alice, that I am — God only knows — 
complaining. But truth is best whatever it is. 
I do feel that. You must n’t be afraid of hurting 
me, my dear." 

Her very hands seemed to quicken in his as now, 
with sleep quite gone, the fret of memory returned, 
and she must reassure both herself and him. 
“But you see, dear, mother had told me that you 
— ^besides, I did know you at once, really; quite 
inside, you know, deep down. I know I was 
perplexed ; I did n’t understand ; but that was all. 
Why, even when you came up in the dark, and we 
talked — if you only knew how miserable I had been 
— though I was aware even then there was some- 
thing different, still I was not a bit afraid. Was I? 


176 


The Return 


And should n’t I have been afraid, horribly 
afraid, if you had not been you? ” She repressed a 
little shudder, and clasped his hand more closely. 

Don’t let us say anything more about it,” she 
implored him; “we are just together again, you 
and I; that is all that matters.” But her words 
were like brave soldiers who have fought their 
way through an ambuscade but have left all 
confidence behind them. 

Lawford listened; and that was enough just 
now — that she still, in spite of doubt, believed in 
him, and thought and cared for him. He seemed 
too tired now to refuse the least kindness. He 
made no answer, but leant his head on the cool, 
slender fingers in gratitude and peace. And, just 
as he was, he almost instantly fell asleep. He 
woke in the darkness to find himself alone. He 
groped his way heavily to the door and turned 
the handle. But now it was really locked. 
Energy failed him. “I suppose — Sheila . . .” 
he muttered. 


CHAPTER XIV 


THE RIFT OF THE YEARS 

Sheila, calm, alert, reserved, was sitting at the 
open window when he awoke again. His break- 
fast tray stood on a little table beside the bed. 
He raised himself on his elbow and looked at his 
wife. The morning light shone fuU on her features 
as she turned quickly at soimd of his stirring. 

You have slept late, she said, in a low, mellow 
voice. 

“ Have I, Sheila? I suppose I was tired out. It 
is very kind of you to have got everything ready 
like this.’* 

am afraid, Arthur, I was thinking rather of 
the maids. I like to inconvenience them as little 
as possible; in their usual routine, I mean. How 
are you feeling, do you think, this morning?” 

— I have n’t seen the glass, Sheila.” 

She paused to place a little pencil tick at the 
foot of the page of her butcher’s book. ”And 
did you — did you try?” 

‘‘Did I try? Try what?” 

“I understood,” she said, turning slowly in her 
177 


12 


178 


The Return 


chair, ^‘you gave me to understand that you went 
out with the specific intention of trying to regain 
. . . But there, forgive me, Arthur; I think I must 
be getting a little bit hardened to the position, so 
far at least as any hope is in my mind of rather 
amateurish experiments being of much help. I may 
seem imsympathetic in saying frankly what I feel. 
But amateurish or no, you are curiously erratic. 
Why, if you really were the Dr. Ferguson whose 
part you play so admirably you could scarcely 
spend a more active life. 

“All you mean, Sheila, I suppose, is that I have 
failed.” 

“‘Failed’ did not enter my mind. I thought, 
looking at you just now in your clothes on the bed, 
one might for the moment be deceived into think- 
ing there was a slight — quite the slightest improve- 
ment. There was not quite that” — she hovered 
for the right word — “that tenseness. Whether 
or no, whether you desired any such change or 
did n’t, I should have supposed in any case it 
would have been better to act as far as possible 
like any ordinary person. You were certainly 
in an extraordinarily sound sleep. I was almost 
alarmed; until I remembered that it was a little 
after two when I looked up from reading aloud 
to keep myself awake and discovered that you 
had only just come home. I had no fire. You 
know how easily late hours bring on my headaches ; 
a little thought might possibly have suggested that 


The Rift of the Years 


179 


I should be anxious to hear. But no; it seems I 
cannot profit by experience, Arthur. And even 
now you have not answered a very natural question. 
You do not recollect, perhaps, exactly what did 
happen last night? Did you go in the direction 
even of Widderstone?” 

Yes, Sheila, I went to Widderstone. ’’ 

“It was, of course, absurd to suppose that sitting 
on a seat beside the broken-down grave of a suicide 
would have the slightest effect on one’s — one’s 
physical condition ; though possibly it might affect 
one’s brain. It would mine; I am at least certain 
of that. It was your own prescription, however; 
and it merely occurred to me to inquire whether 
the actual experience has not brought you round 
to my own opinion.” 

“Yes, I think it has, ” Lawford answered calmly. 
“But I don’t quite see what suicide has got to do 
with it; unless — You know Widderstone then, 
Sheila?” 

“I drove there last Saturday afternoon.” 

“For prayer or praise?” Although Lawford 
had not actually raised his head, he became con- 
scious rather of the wonderfully adjusted mass of 
hair than of the pained dignity in the face that 
was now closely regarding him. 

“I went,” came the rigidly controlled retort, 
“simply to test an inconceivable story.” 

“And returned?” 

“Convinced, Arthur, of its inconceivability. 


i8o 


The Return 


But if you would kindly inform me what precise 
formula you followed at Widderstone last night, 
I would tell you why I think the explanation, or 
rather your first account of the matter, is not an 
explanation of the facts. ” 

Lawford shot a rather doglike glance over his 
toast. ^‘Danton?” he said. 

^‘Candidly, Arthur, Mr. Danton doubts the 
whole story. Your very conduct — well, it would 
serve no useful purpose to go into that. Candidly, 
on the other hand, Mr. Danton did make some 
extremely helpful suggestions — basing them, of 
course, on the truth of your account. He has 
seen a good deal of life; and certainly very mys- 
terious things do occur even to quite innocent, 
well-meaning people without the faintest shadow 
of warning, and as Mr. Bethany himself said, evil 
birds do come home to roost, and often out of 
a clear sky, as it were. But there, every fresh 
solution that occurs to me only makes the thing 
more preposterous, more, I was going to say, 
disreputable — I mean, of course, to the outside 
world. And we have our duties to perform to 
them too, I suppose. Why, what can we say? 
What plausible account of ourselves have we? 
We shall never be able to look anybody in the face 
again. I can only — I am compelled to believe 
that God has been pleased to make this precise 
visitation upon us — an eye for an eye, I suppose, 
somewhere. And to that conviction I shall hold 


The Rift of the Years 


i8i 

until actual circumstances convince me that it ^s 
false. What, however, and this is all that I have 
to say now, what I cannot understand are your 
amazing indiscretions. ” 

“Do you understand your own, Sheila?’^ 

“My indiscretions, Arthur? 

“Well,” said Lawford, “wasn’t it indiscreet, 
don’t you think, to risk divine retribution by 
marrying me? Shouldn’t you have inquired? 
Was n’t it indiscreet to allow me to remain here 
in — in my Visitation’? Wasn’t it indiscreet to 
risk the moral stigma this unhappy face of mine 
must cast on its surroundings? I am not sure 
whether such a change as this constitutes cruelty. 
. . . Oh, what is the use of fretting and babbling 
on like this?” 

“Am I to understand, then, that you refuse 
positively to discuss this horrible business any 
more? You are doing your best to drive me 
away, Arthur; you must see that. Will you be 
very disappointed if I refuse to go?” 

Lawford rose from the bed. “Listen just this 
once, ” he said, seating himself on the comer of the 
dressing-table. “Imagine all this — whatever you 
like to call it — obliterated. Take this, ’ ’ he nodded 
towards the glass, “entirely for itself, on its own 
merits, as it were. Let the dead past bury its 
dead. Which, now, really do you prefer — him,” 
he jerked his head in the direction of the dispas- 
sionate, youthful picture on the wall, “him or me?” 


The Return 


182 

He was so close to her now that he could 
see the faintest tremor on the face that had 
suddenly become grey and still in the thin, clear 
sunshine. 

“I own it, I own it,’* he went on slowly; *‘the 
change is more than skin-deep now. One can’t go 
through what I have gone through these last few 
terrifying days, Sheila, unchanged. They have 
played the devil with my body; now begins the 
tampering with my mind. Not even Dan ton 
knows how it will end. But shall I tell you why 
you won’t, why you can’t answer me that one 
question — ^him or me? Shall I tell you? ” 

Sheila slowly raised her eyes. 

“It is because, my dear, you don’t care the 
ghost of a straw for either. That one — ^he was 
worn out long ago, and we never knew it. I know 
it now. Time and the sheer going-on of day by 
day, without either of us guessing at it, wore that 
down till it had no more meaning for you or me 
than any other faded remembrance in this inter- 
minable footling with truth that we call life. And 
this one — the whole abject meaning of it lies 
simply in the fact that it has pierced down and 
shown us up. I had no courage. I could n’t see 
how feeble a hold I had on life — just one’s friends’ 
opinions. It was all at second hand. What I 
want to know now is — leave me out ; don’t think, 
or care, or regard my living on, one shadow of an 
iota — all I ask is. What am I to do for you?” He 


The Rift of the Years 183 

turned away and stood staring down at the grey 
cinders of the fireplace. 

^‘I answer that mad, wicked outburst with one 
plain question,’' said a low, trembling voice; “did 
you or did you not go to Widderstone yesterday? ” 

“I did go.” 

“You sat there, just as you said you sat before; 
and with all your heart and soul strove to regain — 
yourself?” 

Lawford lifted a still, colourless face into the 
sunlight. “ No, ” he said ; “ I spent the evening at 
the house of a friend. ” 

“Then I say it is infamous. You cast all this 
on me. You have brought me into contempt and 
poisoned Alice’s whole life. You dream and idle 
on just as you used to do, without the least care 
or thought or consideration for others ; and go out 
in this condition — go out absolutely unashamed — 
to spend the evening at a friend’s. Peculiar 
friends they must be! Why, really, Arthur, you 
must be mad!” 

Lawford paused. Like a flock of sheep stream- 
ing helter-skelter before the onset of a wolf were 
the thoughts that a moment before had seemed 
so orderly and sober. “Not mad — possessed,” 
he said softly. 

“And I add this, ” cried Sheila, as it were out of 
a tragic mask, “somewhere in the past, whether of 
your own life, or of the lives of those who brought 
you into the world — the world which you pretend 


The Return 


184 

so conveniently to despise — somewhere is hidden 
some miserable secret. God visits all sins. On 
you has fallen at last the payment. That I 
believe. You can’t run away, any more than a 
child can run away from the cupboard it has been 
locked into for a punishment. Who ’s going to 
hear you now? You have deliberately refused to 
make a friend of me. Fight it out alone, then!” 

Lawford heard the door close, and the dying 
away of the sound that had been the unceasing 
accompaniment of all these later years — the 
rustling of his wife’s skirts, her crisp, authoritative 
footstep. And he turned towards the flooding 
sunlight that streamed in on the upturned surface 
of the looking-glass. No clear, decisive thought 
came into his mind, only a vague recognition that 
so far as Sheila was concerned this was the end. 
No regret, no remorse visited him. He was just 
alone again, that was all — alone, as in reality he 
had always been alone, without having the sense 
or power to see or to acknowledge it. All he had 
said had been the mere flotsam of the moment, 
and now it stood stark and irrevocable between 
himself and the past. 

He sat down dazed and stupid. Again and 
again a struggling recollection tried to obtrude 
itself; again and again he beat it back. And 
rather for something to distract his attention than 
for any real interest or enlightenment he might 
And in its pages, he took out the grimy, dog’s- 


The Rift of the Years 185 

eared book that Herbert had given him, and turned 
slowly over the leaves till he came to Sabathier 
once more. Snatches of remembrance of their 
long talk returned to him, but just as that dark, 
water-haunted house had seemed to banish 
remembrance and the reality of the room in 
which he now sat, and of the old familiar life; so 
now the house, the faces of yesterday seemed in 
their turn unreal, almost spectral, and the thick 
print on the smudgy page no more significant 
than a story one reads and throws away. 

But a moment's comparison in the glass of the 
two faces side by side suddenly sharpened his at- 
tention — the resemblance was so oddly arresting, 
and yet, and yet, so curiously inconclusive. There 
was then something of the stolid old Saxon left, he 
thought. Or had it been regained? Which was 
it? Not merely the complexity of the question, 
but a half-conscious distaste of attempting to face 
it, set him reading- very slowly and laboriously, 
for his French was little more than fragmentary 
recollection, the first few pages of the life of this 
buried Sabathier. But with a disinclination al- 
most amounting to aversion he made very slow 
progress. Many of the words were meaningless 
to him, and every other moment he found himself 
listening with intense concentration for the least 
hint of what Sheila was doing, of what was going 
on in the house beneath him. He had not very 
long to wait. He was sitting with his head leaning 


I86 


The Return 


on his hand, the book unheeded beneath the other 
on the table, when the door opened again behind 
him, and Sheila entered. She stood for a moment, 
calm and dignified, looking down on him through 
her veil. 

“Please understand, Arthur, that I am not tak- 
ing this step in pique, or even in anger. It would 
serve no purpose to go on like this — this incessant 
heedlessness and recrimination. There have been 
mistakes, misconceptions, perhaps, on both sides. 
To me, naturally yours are most conspicuous. 
That need not, however, blind me to my own.’’’ 

She paused in vain for an answer. 

“Think the whole thing over candidly and 
quietly, ’’ she began again in a quiet, rapid voice. 
“Have you really shown the slightest regard, I 
won’t say for me, or even for Alice, but for just 
the obvious difficulties and — and proprieties of our 
position? I have given up as far as I can brood- 
ing on and on over the same horrible, impossible 
thoughts. I withdraw unreservedly what I said 
just now about punishment. It is not even a 
wife’s place to judge like that. You will forgive 
me that?’’ 

Lawford did not turn his head. “Of course,’’ 
he said, looking rather vacantly out of the win- 
dow, “it was only in the heat of the moment, 
Sheila; though, who knows? it may be true.’’ 

“Well,’’ she took hold of the great brass knob 
at the foot of the bed with one gloved hand — “well, 


The Rift of the Years 


187 


I feel it is my duty to withdraw it. Apart from 
it, I see only too clearly that even though all that 
has happened in these last few days was in reality 
nothing but a horrible nightmare, I see that even 
then what you have said about our married life 
together can never be recalled. You have told 
me quite deliberately that for years past your life 
has been nothing but a pretence — a sham. You 
implied that mine had been too. Honestly, I 
was not aware of it, Arthur. But supposing all 
that has happened to you had been merely what 
might happen at any moment to anybody, some 
actual defacement (you will forgive me suggesting 
such a horrible thing) — why, if what you say is 
true, even in that case my sympathy would have 
been only a continual fret and annoyance to you. 
And this — this change, I own, is infinitely harder 
to bear. It would be an outrage on common-sense 
and on all that we hold seemly and — and sacred in 
life, even in some trumpery story. You do, you 
must see all that, Arthur? ” 

“Oh, yes,’’ said Lawford, narrowing his eyes to 
pierce through the sunlight, “I see all that.” 

“Then we need not go over it all again. What- 
ever others may say, or think, I shall still, at least 
so long as nothing occurs to the contrary, keep 
firmly to my present convictions. Mr. Bethany 
has assured me repeatedly that he has no — ^no 
misgivings; that he understands. And even if I 
still doubted, which I don’t, Arthur, though it 


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The Return 


would be rather trying to have to accept one’s 
husband at second-hand, as it were, I should have 
to be satisfied. I daresay even such an unheard- 
of thing as what we are discussing now, or some- 
thing equally ghastly, does occur occasionally — in 
foreign countries, perhaps. I have not studied such 
things enough to say. We were all very much re- 
stricted in our reading as children, and I honestly 
think, not unwisely. It is enough for the present 
to repeat that I do believe, and that whatever may 
happen — and I know absolutely nothing about the 
procedure in such cases — but whatever may hap- 
pen, I shall still be loyal ; I shall always have your 
interests at heart.” Her words faltered and she 
turned her head away. ‘^You did love me once, 
Arthur, I can’t forget that. ” The contralto voice 
trembled ever so little, and the gloved hand 
smoothed gently the brass knob beneath. 

‘‘If,” said Lawford, resting his face on his 
hands, and curiously watching the while his mov- 
ing reflection in the looking-glass before him — “if 
I said I still loved you, what then?” 

“But you have already denied it, Arthur.” 

“Yes; but if I said that that too was said only 
in haste, that brooding over the trouble this — this 
metamorphosis was bringing on us all had driven 
me almost beyond endurance: supposing that I 
withdrew all that and instead said now that I do 
still love you, just as I — ” he turned a little, and 
turned back again, “like this?” 


The Rift of the Years 189 

Sheila paused. ‘ ‘ Could any woman answer such 
a question?’' she almost sighed at last. 

“Yes, but,” Lawford pressed on, in a voice 
almost as naive and stubborn as a child’s, “if I 
tried to — to make you? I did once, Sheila.” 

“I can’t, I can’t conceive such a position. 
Surely that alone is almost as frantic as it is 
heartless! Is it, is it even right?” 

“ Well, I have not actually asked it. I own, ” he 
added moodily, almost imder his breath, “it 
would be. . . . But there, Sheila, this poor old 
mask of mine is wearing out. I am somehow 
convinced of that. What will be left, God only 
knows. You were saying — ” He rose abruptly. 
“Please, please sit down,” he said; “I did not 
notice you were standing.” 

“I shall not keep you a moment,” she an- 
swered hturiedly; “I will sit here. The truth 
is, Arthur,” she began again almost solemnly, 
“apart from all sentiment and — and good inten- 
tions, my presence here only harasses you and 
keeps you back. I am not so bound up in myself 
that I cannot realise that. The consequence is 
that after calmly — and I hope considerately — 
thinking the whole thing over, I have come to the 
conclusion that it would arouse very little com- 
ment, the least possible perhaps in the circum- 
stances, if I just went away for a few days. You 
are not in any sense ill. In fact, I have never 
known you so, so robust, so energetic. You 


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will be alone: Mr. Bethany, perhaps . . . You 
could go out and come in just as you pleased. 
Possibly,” Sheila smiled frankly beneath her veil, 
‘‘even this Dr. Ferguson you have invented will 
he a help. It ^s only the servants that remain to 
be considered. ” 

“I should prefer to be quite alone.” 

“Then do not worry about them. I can easily 
explain. And if you would not mind letting her 
in, Mrs. Gull can come in every other day or so 
just to keep things in order. She ’s entirely 
trustworthy and discreet. Or perhaps, if you 
would prefer ’ * 

“Mrs. Gull will do nicely, Sheila. It ’s very 
good of you to have given me so much thought.” 
A long, rather arduous pause followed. 

“Oh, one other thing, Arthur. You sent out 
to Mr. Critchett — do you remember? — the night 
you first came home. I think, too, after the first 
awful shock, when we were sitting in our bedroom, 
you actually referred to — to violent measures. 
You will promise me, I may, perhaps, at least 
ask that, you will promise me on your word of 
honour, for Alice’s sake, if not for mine, to do 
nothing rash.” 

“Yes, yes,” said Lawford, sinking lower even 
than he had supposed possible into the thin and 
lightless chill of ennui, “nothing rash.” 

Sheila rose with a sigh only in part suppressed. 
“I have not seen Mr. Bethany again. I think. 


The Rift of the Years 


191 

however, it would be better to let Harry know; I 
mean, dear, of your derangement. After all, he is 
one of the family — at least, of mine. He will not 
interfere. He would, perhaps quite naturally, be 
hurt if we did not take him into our confidence. 
Otherwise there is no pressing cause for haste, 
at least for another week or so. After that, I 
suppose, something will have to be done. Then 
there 's Mr. Wedderbum; would n’t it be as well 
to let him know that at least for the present you 
are quite unable to think of returning to town? . 
That, too, in time will have to be arranged, I 
suppose, if nothing happens meanwhile; I mean if 
things don’t come right. And I do hope, Arthur, 
you will not set your mind too closely on what 
may prove only false hopes! This is all intensely 
painful to me; of course, to us both.” 

Again Lawford, even though he did not turn to 
confront it, became conscious of the black veil 
turned towards him tentatively, speculatively, 
impenetrably. 

“Yes,” he said, “I ’ll write to Wedderbum ; he ’s 
had his ups and downs, too.” 

“I always rather fancied so,” said Sheila 
reflectively, “he looks rather a — a restless man. 
Oh, and then again, ” she broke off quickly, 
“there ’s the question of money. I suppose — ^it 
is only a conjecture — I suppose it would be better 
to do nothing in that direction just for the present. 
Ada has now gone to the bank. Fifty pounds. 


192 


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Arthur; it is out of my own private account — do 
you think that will be enough, just, of course, for 
your present needs?” 

“As a bribe, hush-money, or a thank-offering, 
Sheila?” murmured her husband wearily. 

“I don’t follow you,” replied the discreet voice 
from beneath the veil. 

He did actually turn this time and glance 
steadily over his shoulder. “How long are you 
going for? and where?” 

“I proposed to go to my cousin’s, Mrs. Lovat’s; 
that is, of course, if you have no objection. It ’s 
near ; it will be a long-deferred visit ; and she need 
know very little. And, of course, if for the least 
thing in the world you should want me, there I am 
within call, as it were. And you will write? We 
are acting for the best, Arthur?” 

“So long as it is your best, Sheila.” 

Sheila pondered. “You think, you mean 
they ’ll all say I ought to have stayed. Candidly, 
I can’t see it in that light. Surely every expe- 
rience of life proves that in intimate domestic 
matters, and especially in those between husband 
and wife, only the parties concerned have any 
means of judging what is best for them? It has 
been our experience at any rate: though I must 
in fairness confess that, outwardly at least, I 
have n’t had much of that kind of thing to 
complain of. ” Sheila paused again for a reply. 

“What kind of thing?” 


The Rift of the Years 


193 


“ Domestic experience, dear. ” 

The house was quiet. There was not a sound 
stirring in the still, sunny road of orchards and 
discreet and drowsy villas. A long silence fol- 
lowed, immensely active and alert on the one 
side, almost morbidly lethargic so far as the 
stooping figure in front of the looking-glass was 
concerned. 

At last the last haunting question came in a 
kind of croak, as if only by a supreme effort could 
it be compelled to produce itself for consideration. 
^‘And Alice, Sheila?” 

Alice, dear, of course goes with me.” 

^‘You realise,” he stirred uneasily, realise 
it may be final. ” 

“My dear Arthur,” cried Sheila, “it is surely, 
apart from mere delicacy, a parental obligation to 
screen the poor child from the shock. Could she 
be at such a time in any better keeping than her 
mother’s? At present she only vaguely guesses. 
To know definitely that her father, infinitely 
worse than death, had — ^had — Oh, is it possible 
to realise anything in this awful cloud? It would 
kill her outright.” 

Lawford md!fle no stir. The quietest of raps 
came at the door. “The money from the bank, 
m’m, ” said a faint voice. 

Sheila carefully opened the door a few inches. 
She laid the blue envelope on the dressing-table 
at her husband’s elbow. “You had better, 


13 


194 


The Return 


perhaps, count it,’’ she said in a low voice; 
'‘forty in notes, the rest in gold,” and narrowed 
her eyes beneath her veil upon her husband’s very 
peculiar method of forgetting his responsibilities. 

“French?” she said with a nod. “How very 
quaint!” 

Lawford’s eyes fell and rested gravely on the 
dingy page of Herbert’s mean-looking bundle of 
print. A queer feeling of cold crept over him. 
“Yes, ” he said vaguely, “French, ” and hopelessly 
failed to fill in the silence that seemed like some 
rather sleek nocturnal creature quietly waiting to 
be fed. 

Sheila swept softly towards the door. “Well, 
Arthur, I think that is all. The servants will have 
gone by this evening. I have ordered a carriage 
for half -past twelve. If you would just write 
down anything that occurs to you to be necessary. 
Perhaps, too, it would be better if Dr. Simon were 
told that we shall not need him any more, that 
you are thinking of a complete change of scene, a 
voyage. He is obviously useless. Besides, Mr. 
Bethany, I think, is going to discuss a specialist 
with you. I have written him a little note, just 
briefly explaining. Shall I write to Dr. Simon 
too?” 

“You remember everything, ” said Lawford, and 
it seemed to him it was a remark he had heard ages 
and ages ago. “ It ’s only this money, Sheila; will 
you please take that away?” 


The Rift of the Years 


195 


‘‘Take it away?’ 

“I think, Sheila, if I do take a voyage I should 
almost prefer to work my passage. As for a mere 
‘change of scene,’ that ’s quite uncostly.” 

“It is only your face, Arthur,” said Sheila 
solemnly, “that suggests these wicked stabs. 
Some day you will perhaps repent of every one.” 

“It is possible, Sheila; we none of us stand still, 
you know. One rips open a lid sometimes and the 
wax face rots before one’s eyes. Take your blue 
envelope, Sheila; and thank you for thinking of 
me. It ’s always the woman of the house that has 
the head.” 

“I wish,” said Sheila almost pathetically, and 
yet with a faint quaver of resignation, “I wish it 
could be said that the man of the house sometimes 
has the heart. Think it over, Arthur!” 

Sheila, with her husband’s luncheon tray, 
brought also her farewells. Lawford surveyed, not 
without a faint, shy stirring of increduHty, the 
superbly restrained presence. He stood before 
her dry-lipped, inartictdate, a schoolboy caught 
red-handed in the shabbiest of offences. 

“It is your wish that I go, Arthur?” she said 
pleadingly. 

He handed her her money without a word. 

“Very well, Arthur; if you won’t take it,” she 
said. “I should scarcely have thought this the 
occasion for mere pride.” 

“The tenth,” she continued, as she squeezed 


196 


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the envelope into her purse, with only the least 
hardening of voice, “although I daresay you have 
not troubled to remember it — the tenth will be the 
eighteenth anniversary of our wedding-day. It 
makes parting, however advisable, and though 
only for the few days we should think nothing of in 
happier circumstances, a little harder to bear. But 
there, all will come right. You will see things in 
a different light, perhaps. Words may wound, but 
time will heal.” But even as she now looked 
closely into his colourless, sunken face some dis- 
tant memory seemed to well up irresistibly — the 
memory of eyes just as naive, just as unassimiing, 
that even in claiming her love had expressed only 
their own stolid unworthiness. 

“Did you know it? have you seen it?” she said, 
stooping forward a little. “I believe in spite of 
all . . . ” He gazed on solemnly, almost owlishly, 
out of his fading mask. 

“Wait till Mr. Bethany tells you; you will 
believe it perhaps from him.” He saw the grey- 
gloved hand a little reluctantly lifted towards 
him. 

“Good-bye, Sheila,” he said, and turned dimly 
back to the window. 

She hesitated, listening to a small far-away 
voice that kept urging her with an almost frog- 
like pertinacity to do, to say something, and yet 
as stubbornly would not say what; and she was 
gone. 


CHAPTER XV 


THE RETREAT OF THE INTRUDER 

Raying and gleaming in the simlight, the hired 
landau drove up to the gate. Lawford, peeping 
between the blinds, looked down on the coachman, 
with reins hanging loosely from his red, squat- 
thumbed hand, seated in his tight livery and inde- 
scribable hat on the faded cushions. One thing 
only was in his mind; and it was almost with an 
audible cry that he turned towards the figure that 
edged, white and trembling, into the chill and si- 
lent room. He took the narrow shoulders in his 
arms and covered the light-brown hair with kisses. 

Don’t look at me, don’t look at me,” he said, 
‘‘only remember, dearest, I would rather have 
died down there and never again been seen than 
have given you pain. Rim — run, your mother ’s 
calling. Write to me, think of me; good-bye!” 

He threw himself on the bed and lay there till 
evening, till the door had shut gently behind the 
last rat to leave the sinking ship. All the clear- 
ness, the calmness were gone again. Round and 
round in dizzy sickening flare and clatter his 
thoughts whirled. Contempt, fear, loathing, 
197 


198 


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blasphemy, laughter, longing: there was no end. 
Death was no end. There was no meaning, no 
refuge, no hope, no possible peace. To give up 
was to go to perdition : to go forward was to go 
mad. And even madness — he sat up with trem- 
bling lips in the twilight — madness itself was only a 
state, only a state. You might be bereaved, and 
the pain and hopelessness of that would pass. You 
might be cast out, betrayed, deserted, and still be 
you, still find solitude lovely and in a brave face a 
friend. But madness! — it surged in on him with 
all the clearness and emptiness of a dream. And he 
sat quite still, his hand clutching the bedclothes, 
his head askew, waiting for the soimd of footsteps, 
for the presences and the voices that have their 
thin-walled dwelling beneath the shallow crust 
of consciousness. Inky blackness drifted up in 
wisps, in smoke before his eyes ; he was powerless to 
move, to cry out. There was no room to turn ; no 
air to breathe. And yet there was a low, continu- 
ous, never-varying stir as of an enormous wheel 
whirling in the gloom. Countless infinitesimal 
faces arched like glimmering pebbles the huge, dim- 
coloured vault above his head. He heard a voice 
above the monstrous rustling of the wheel, clam- 
ouring, calling him back. He was hastening head- 
long, muttering to himself his own fiat, meaningless 
name, like a child repeating as he runs his errand. 
And then as if in a charmed, cold pool he awoke 
and opened his eyes again on the gathering 


The Retreat of the Intruder 199 


darkness of the great bedroom, and heard a quick, 
importunate, long-continued knocking on the door 
below, as of some one who had already knocked in 
vain. 

Cramped and heavy-limbed, he felt his way 
across the room and lit a candle. He stood 
listening awhile, with eyes fixed on the door that 
stood a little open. All in the room seemed 
acutely, fantastically still. The fiame burned 
dim, enisled in the sluggish air. He stole softly 
to the door and looked out and again listened. 
Again the knocking broke out more impetuously 
and yet still with a certain restraint and caution. 
Shielding the flame of his candle in the shell of 
his left hand, Lawford moved slowly, with chin 
uplifted, to the stairs. He bent forward a little, 
and stood motionless and drawn up, with pupils 
slowly contracting and expanding, as he gazed 
down into the carpeted vacant gloom, past the 
dim, louring presence that had fallen back before 
him. 

His mouth opened. Who’s there?” at last 
he called. 

Thank God, thank God!” he heard Mr. 
Bethany mutter. ^T mustn’t call, Lawford,” 
came a hurried whisper as if the old gentleman 
were pressing his lips to speak through the letter- 
box. ‘‘Come down and open the door; there’s a 
good fellow! I ’ve been knocking no end of a 
time.” 


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‘‘Yes, I am coming,” said Lawford. He shut 
his mouth and held his breath, and stair by stair he 
descended, driving steadily before him the crouch- 
ing, gloating, menacing form, darkly lifted up 
before him against the darkness, contending the 
way with him. 

“Are you ill? Are you hurt? Has anything 
happened, Lawford?” came the anxious old voice 
again, striving in vain to be restrained. 

“No, no,” muttered Lawford, “I am coming; 
coming slowly.” He paused to breathe, his hands 
trembling, his hair lank with sweat, and still with 
eyes wide open he descended against the phantom 
lurking in the darkness — ^an adversary that, if he 
should but close his lids, he felt would master 
sanity and imagination with its evil. “So long 
as you don’t get in,” he heard himself muttering, 
“so long as you don’t get m, my friend!” 

“What’s that you’re saying?” came up the 
muffled, querulous voice; “I can’t for the life of 
me hear, my boy.” 

“Nothing, nothing,” came softly the answer 
from the foot of the stairs. “ I was only speaking 
to myself.” 

Quite deliberately, with candle held rigidly on 
a level with his eyes, Lawford pushed forward a 
pace or two into the airless, empty drawing-room, 
and grasped the handle of the door. He gazed in 
awhile, a black, oblique shadow across his face, his 
eyes fixed like an animal’s, then drew the door 


The Retreat of the Intruder 201 


steadily towards him. And suddenly some power 
that had held him tense seemed to fail. He thrust 
out his head, and, his face quivering with fear and 
loathing, spat defiance as it were in a passion of 
triumph into the gloom. 

Still muttering, he shut the door and turned the 
key. In another moment his candle was gleaming 
out on the grey, perturbed face and black, narrow 
shoulders of his visitor. 

“You gave me quite a fright,’* said the old 
man almost angrily; “have you hurt your foot, 
or something?” 

“It was very dark,” said Lawford, “down the 
stairs.” 

“What!” said Mr. Bethany still more angrily, 
blinking out of his unspectacled eyes; “has she cut 
off the gas, then?” 

“You got the note?” said Lawford, unmoved. 

“Yes, yes; I got the note. . . . Gone?” 

“Oh, yes; all gone. It was my choice. I pre- 
ferred it so.” 

Mr. Bethany sat down on one of the hard old 
wooden chairs that stood on either side the lofty 
hall, and breathing rather thickly rested his hands 
on his knees. “What ’s happened?” he inquired, 
looking up into the candle. “ I left my glasses, old 
fool that I am, and can’t, my dear chap, see you 
very plainly. But your voice ” 

“ I think,” said Lawford, “ I think it ’s beginning 
to come back.” 


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*‘What, the whole thing! Oh, no, my dear 
fellow; be frank with me; not the whole thing?” 

^‘Yes,” said Lawford, ^‘the whole thing — very, 
very gradually, imperceptibly. I think even 
Sheila noticed. But I rather feel it than see it; 
that is all. ...I’m cornering him.” 

“Him?” 

Lawford jerked his candle as if towards some 
definite goal. “ In time,” he said. 

The two faces with the candle between them 
seemed as it were to gain light each from the other. 

“Well, well,” said Mr. Bethany, “every man for 
himself, Lawford; it ’s the only way. But what’s 
going to be done — we must you know : the others? ” 

“Oh, that,” said Lawford; “she’s going to 
squeeze me out.” 

“You ’ve squabbled? Oh, but my dear, honest 
old, honest old idiot, there ’s scores of families here 
in this parish, within a stone’s throw, that squabble, 
wrangle, all but politely tear each other’s eyes out, 
every day of their earthly lives. It ’s perfectly 
natural. Where should we poor old busybodies 
be else. Peace on earth we bring, and it ’s mainly 
between husband and wife.” 

“ Yes,” said Lawford, “but you see, this was not 
our earthly life. It was between us, ’ ’ 

“Listen, listen to the dear mystic!” exclaimed 
the old creature scoffingly. “What depths we ’re 
touching! Here’s the first serious break of his 
lifetime, and he’s gone stark, staring transcen- 


The Retreat of the Intruder 203 


dental! Ah, well!” He paused and glanced 
quickly about him, with his curious birdlike 
poise of head. *‘But you ’re not alone here?” he 
inquired suddenly; “not absolutely alone?” 

“Yes,” said Lawford; “but there’s plenty to 
think about — and read. I have n’t thought or 
read for years.” 

“No, nor I ; after thirty, my dear boy, one merely 
annotates, and the book ’s called Life. Bless me, 
his solemn old voice is grinding epigrams out of 
even this poor old parochial barrel-organ. You 
don’t suppose, my dear boy, you are the only 
serious person in the world? What ’s more, it ’s 
only skin deep.” 

Lawford smiled. “Skin deep. But think 
quietly over it; you ’ll see I ’m done.” 

“Come here,” said Mr. Bethany. “Where’s 
the whiskey, where ’s the cigars? You shall 
smoke and drink, and I ’ll watch. If it were n’t 
for a pitiful old stomach, I ’d join you. Come 
on!” He led the way into the dining-room. He 
looked tinier, more wizened, and sinewy than ever 
as he stooped to open the sideboard. “Where 
on earth do they keep everything?” he was 
muttering to himself. 

Lawford put the candlestick down on the table. 
“There ’s only one thing,” he said, watching his 
visitor’s rummaging; “what precisely do you 
think they will do with me? ” 

“Look here, Lawford,” snapped Mr. Bethany; 


204 


The Return 


“IVe come round here, hooting through your 
letter-box to talk sense, not sentiment. Why has 
your wife deserted you? Without a servant, 
without a single — It ’s perfectly monstrous!’* 

^‘On my word of honour, I prefer it so. I 
could n*t have gone on. Alone I all but forget 
this — this lupus. Every turn of her little finger 
reminded me of it. We are alone, whether we 
know it or not ; you said it yourself. And it ’s 
better to realise it stark and imconfused. Besides, 
you have no idea what — what odd things . . . 
there may be; there is something on the other side. 
I ’ll win through to that.” 

Mr. Bethany had been listening attentively. He 
scrambled up from his knees with a half -empty 
syphon of soda-water. ^‘Look here, Lawford,” 
he said; “if you really want to know what ’s your 
most insidious and most dangerous symptom just 
now, it is spiritual pride. You ’ve won what you 
think a domestic victory; and you can scarcely 
bear the splendour. Oh, you may shrug! Pray, 
what is this ^other side’ which the superior 
double-faced creature’s going to win through to 
now?” He rapped it out almost bitterly, almost 
contemptuously. 

Lawford hardly heard the question. Before his 
eyes had suddenly arisen the peace, the friendly, 
unquestioning stillness, the thunderous lullaby old 
as the grave. “It’s only a fancy. It seemed I 
could begin again.” 


The Retreat of the Intruder 205 


‘‘Well, look here,^^ said Mr. Bethany, his whole 
face suddenly lined and grey with age. “You 
can’t. It ’s the one solitary thing I ’ve got to say, 
as I ’ve said to myself mom, noon, and night these 
scores of years. You can’t begin again; it ’s all a 
delusion and a snare. You say we ’re alone. So 
we are. The world ’s a dream, a stage, a mirage, 
a rack, call it what you will — but you don’t change, 
you We no illusion. There ’s no crying off for 
you, no ravelling out, no clean leaves. You ’ve got 
this — this trouble, this affliction — my dear, dear 
fellow, what shall I say to tell you how I grieve and 
groan for you — oh, yes, and actually laughed, I 
confess it, a vile hysterical laughter, to think of it. 
You ’ve got this almost intolerable burden to bear ; 
it ’s come like a thief in the night ; but bear it you 
must, and alone ! They say death ’s a going to 
bed ; I doubt it ; but anyhow life ’s a long undressing. 
We came in puling and naked, and every stitch 
must come off before we get out again. We must 
stand on our feet in all our Rabelaisian nakedness, 
and watch the world fade. Well then, and not 
another word of sense shall you worm out of my 
worn-out old brains after to-day — all I say is, 
don’t give in! Why, if you stood here now, freed 
from this devilish disguise, the old, fat, sluggish 
fellow that sat and yawned his head off under my 
eyes in his pew the Stmday before last, if I know 
anything about human nature I ’d say it to your 
face, and a fig for your vanity and resignation — 


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The Return 


your last state will be worse than the first. There ! ' ’ 
He bunched up a big white handkerchief and 
mopped it over his head. “That ^s done,” he said, 
“and we won’t go back. What I want to know 
now is what are you going to do? Where are you 
sleeping? What are you going to think about? 
I ’ll stay — yes, yes, that ’s what it must be: I 
must stay. And I detest strange beds. I ’ll 
stay, you sha'rCt be alone. Do you hear me, 
Lawford? — you sha'nH be alone!” 

Lawford gazed gravely. ^ ‘ There is just one little 
thing I wanted to ask you before you go. I ’ve 
wormed out an extraordinary old French book; and 
— ^just as you say — to pass the time, I ’ve been 
having a shot at translating it. But I ’m fright- 
fully rusty; it ’s old French; would you mind 
having a look?” 

Mr. Bethany blinked and listened. He tried 
for the twentieth time to dodge his friend’s eyes, to 
gain as best he could some sustained, imobserved 
glance at this baffling face. “Where is your 
precious French book?” he said irritably. 

“It ’s upstairs.” 

“Fire away, then!” Lawford rose and glanced 
about the room. “What, no light there either?” 
snapped Mr. Bethany. “Take this; I don’t mind 
the dark. There ’ll be plenty of that for me 
soon.” 

Lawford hesitated at the door, looking rather 
strangely back. ‘ ‘ No,” he said, ' ‘ there are matches 


The Retreat of the Intruder 207 


upstairs . * ’ He shut the door after him . The dark- 
ness seemed cold and still as water. He went 
slowly up, with eyes fixed wide on the floating, 
luminous gloom, and out of memory seemed to 
gather, as faintly as in the darkness which they 
had exorcised for him, the strange, pitiful eyes 
of the night before. And as he moimted a chill, 
terrible, physical peace seemed to steal over him. 

Mr. Bethany was sitting as he had left him, 
looking steadily on the floor, when Lawford re- 
turned. He flattened out the book on the table 
with a sniff of impatience. And dragging the 
candle nearer, he adjusted his reading-glasses, and 
began to read. 

Was this in the house? he inquired presently, 
said Lawford; ^‘it was lent to me by a 
friend — Herbert.” 

^‘H’m! don’t know him. Anyhow, precious 
poor stuff this is. This Sabathier, whoever he is, 
seems to be a kind of clap-trap, eighteenth-century 
adventurer who thought the world would be better 
off, apparently, for a long account of all his senti- 
mental amours. Rousseau, with a touch of Don 
Quixote in his composition, and an echo of that 
prince of bogies, Poe! What, in the name of 
wonder, induced you to fix on this for your holiday 
reading?” 

^‘Sabathier ’s alive, is n’t he?” 

I never said he was n’t. He ’s a good deal too 
much alive for my old wits, with his Mam’selle 


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This and Madame The Other; interesting enough, 
perhaps, for the professional literary nose with a 
taste for patchouli.” 

“Yet I suppose even that is not a very rare 
character? ” 

Mr. Bethany peered over his glasses at his 
ingenuous questioner. “I should say decidedly 
that the fellow was a very rare character, so long as 
by rare you don’t mean good. It ’s one of the 
dullest stupidities of the present day, my dear 
fellow, to dote on a man simply because he ’s 
different from the rest of us. Once a man strays 
out of the common herd, he ’s more likely to meet 
wolves in the thickets than angels. From what I 
can gather in just these few pages this Sabathier 
appears to have been an amorous, adventiurous, 
emotional Frenchman, who went to the dogs as 
easily and as rapidly as his own natme and his 
period allowed. And I should say, Lawford, that 
he made precious bad reading for a poor old trou- 
bled hermit like yourself at the present moment.” 

“There ’s a portrait of him a few pages back.” 

Mr. Bethany, with some little impatience, turned 
back to the engraving. “ ‘ Nicholas de Sabathier,’ ” 
he muttered. “‘De,’ indeed!” He poked in at 
the foxy print with narrowed eyes. “I don’t 
deny it ’s a striking, even, perhaps, a rather taking 
face. I don’t deny it.” He gazed on with an 
even more acute concentration, and looked up 
sharply. “Look here, Lawford, what in the name 


The Retreat of the Intruder 209 

of wonder — what trick are you playing on me 
now? ” 

'‘Trick?'’ said Lawford; and the word fell with 
the tiniest plash in the silence, like a vivid little 
float upon the surface of a shadowy pool. 

The old face flushed. “What conceivable bear- 
ing, I say, has this dead and gone old roue on us 
now?” 

“You don’t think you see any resemblance — any 
resemblance at all?” 

“Resemblance?” repeated Mr. Bethany in a 
flat voice, and without raising his face again to 
meet Lawford’s direct scrutiny. “Resemblance 
to whom?” 

“To me? To me, as I am?” 

“But even, my dear fellow (forgive my dull old 
brains!), even if there was just the faintest super- 
flcial suggestion of — of that; what then?” 

“Why,” said Lawford, “he ’s buried in Widder- 
stone.” ^ 

“Buried in Widderstone?” The keen, childlike 
blue eyes looked almost stealthily up across the 
book; the old man sat without speaking, so still 
that it might even be supposed he himself was 
listening for a very distant footfall. 

“He is buried in the grave beside which I fell 
asleep,” said Lawford; “all green and still and 
broken,” he added faintly. “You remember,” 
he went on in a repressed voice — “you remem- 
ber you asked me if there was anybody else in 
14 


210 


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sight, any eavesdropper? You don’t think — 
him?” 

Mr. Bethany pushed the book a few inches away 
from him. “Who, did you say, who was it you 
said put the thing into your head? A queer friend 
surely?” he paused helplessly. ”And how, pray, 
do you know,” he began again more firmly, ^^even 
if there is a Sabathier buried at Widderstone, how 
do you know it is this Sabathier? It 's not, I 
think,” he added boldly, ''a very imcommon 
name; with two b^s at any rate. Whereabouts 
is the grave?” 

“Quite down at the bottom, under the trees. 
And the little seat I told you of is there, too, where 
I fell asleep. You see,” he explained, “the grave ’s 
almost isolated ; I suppose because he killed 
himself.” 

Mr. Bethany clasped his knuckled fingers on 
the table-cloth. “It’s no good,” he concluded 
after a long pause; “the fellow’s got up into my 
head. I can’t think him out. We must thrash it 
out quietly in the morning with the blessed sun at 
the window; not this farthing dip. To me the 
whole idea is as revolting as it is incredible. Why, 
above a century — no, no ! And on the other hand, 
how easily one ’s fancy builds ! A few straws 
and there ’s a nest and squawking fledglings, all 
complete. Is that why — ^is that why that good, 
practical wife of yours and all your faithful house- 
hold have absconded? Does it” — he threw up 


The Retreat of the Intruder 211 


his head as if towards the house above them — 
“does it reek with him?“ 

Lawf ord shook his head. ' ‘ She has n’t seen him. 
I have n’t told her.” 

Mr. Bethany tossed the hugger-mugger of 
pamphlets across the table. “Then, for simple 
sanity’s sake, don’t. Hide it; bum it; put the 
thing completely out of your mind. A friend! 
Who, where is this wonderful friend?” 

“Not very far from Widderstone. He lives — 
practically alone.” 

“And all that stumbling and muttering on the 
stairs?” he leant forward almost threateningly. 
“There is n’t anybody here? ” 

* ‘ Oh, no, ’ ’ said Lawf ord. “We are quite alone — 
with this, you know,” he pointed to the book, and 
smiled frankly, however faintly. 

Again Mr. Bethany sank into a fixed yet un- 
easy reverie, and again shook himself and raised 
his eyes. 

“Well, then,” he said, in a voice almost morose 
in its fretfulness, “what I suggest is that first you 
keep quiet here; and next, that you write and get 
your wife back. You say you are better. I 
think you said she herself noticed a slight improve- 
ment. Is n’t it just exactly what I foresaw? And 
yet she’s gone! But that’s not our business. 
Get her back! And don’t for a single instant 
waste a thought on the other; not for a single 
instant, I implore you, Lawf ord. And in a week 


212 


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the whole thing will be no more than a dreary, 
preposterous dream. . . . You don't answer me!” 
he cried impulsively. 

But can one so easily forget a dream like this? ” 

*‘You don’t speak out, Lawford; you mean she 
won’t.” 

^Tt must at least seem to have been in part of 
my own seeking, or contriving; or at any rate — 
she said it — of my own hereditary or unconscious 
deserving.” 

“She said that!” Mr. Bethany sat back. “I 
see, I see,” he said. “I’m nothing but a fumbling 
old meddler. And there was I, not ten minutes 
ago, preaching for all I was worth on a text I knew 
nothing about. God bless me, Lawford, how long 
we take a-learning! I ’ll say no more. But what 
an illusion ! To think this— this ” — ^he laid a long, 
lean hand at arm’s length fiat upon the table 
toward his friend — “to think this is our old jog-trot 
Arthur Lawford! From henceforth I throw you 
over, you old wolf in sheep’s wool! I wash my 
hands of you. And now where am I going to 
sleep?” 

He covered up his age and weariness for an 
instant with a small, crooked hand. 

Lawford took a deep breath. “You ’re going, 
old friend, to sleep at home. And I — I ’m go- 
ing to give you my arm to the Vicarage gate. 
Here I am, immeasurably relieved, fitter than 
I ’ve been since I was a dolt of a schoolboy. On 


The Retreat of the Intruder 213 


my word of honour: I can’t say why, but I am. 
I don’t care that, vicar, honestly — ^puffed up with 
spiritual pride. If a man can’t sleep with pride for 
a bedfellow, well, he ’d better try elsewhere. It ’s 
no good ; I ’m as stubborn as a mule ; that ’s at 
least a relic of the old man. I care no more,” he 
raised his voice firmly and gravely — “I don’t care 
a jot for solitude, not a jot for all the ghosts of all 
the catacombs!” 

Mr. Bethany listened, grimly pursed up his lips. 

Not a jot for all the ghosts of all the catechisms! ” 
he muttered, “nor the devil himself, I suppose!” 
He turned once more to glance sharply in the 
direction of the face he could so dimly — and of 
set purpose — discern ; and without a word trotted 
off into the hall. Lawford followed with the 
candle. 

“ ’Pon my word, you have n’t had a mouthful of 
supper. Let me forage; just a quarter of an hour, 
eh?” 

“Not me,” said Mr. Bethany; “if you won’t 
have me, home I go. I refuse to encourage this 
miserable grass-widowering. What would they 
say? What would the busybodies say? Ghouls 
and graves and shocking mysteries! — Selina! 
Sister Anne ! ' Come on ! ” 

He shuffled on his hat and caught firm hold of 
his knobbed umbrella. “Better not leave a 
candle,” he said. 

Lawford blew out the candle. 


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“What, what?” called the old man suddenly; 
but no voice had spoken. 

A thin trickle of light from the lamp in the street 
stuck up through the fanlight as, with a smile 
that could be described neither as mischievous, 
saturnine, nor vindictive, and was yet faintly sug- 
gestive of all three, Lawford quietly opened the 
drawing-room door and put down the candlestick 
on the floor within. 

‘ ‘ What on earth, my good man, are you fumbling 
after now?” came the almost fretful question from 
under the echoing porch. 

“Coming, coming,” said Lawford, and slammed 
the door behind them. 


CHAPTER XVI 


THE UNDERSTANDING OF SYMPATHY 

The first faint streaks of dawn were silvering 
across the stars when Lawford again let himself 
into his deserted house. He stumbled down to the 
pantry and cut himself a crust of bread and cheese, 
and ate it, sitting on the table, watching the leafy 
eastern sky through the painted bars of the area 
window. He munched on, hungry and tired. His 
night walk had cooled head and heart. Having 
obstinately refused Mr. Bethany’s invitation to 
sleep at the Vicarage, he had sat down on an old 
low wall, and watched until his light had shone out ^ 
at his bedroom window. Then he had simply 
wandered on, past rustling, glimmering gardens, 
under the great timbers of yellowing elms, hardly 
thinking, hardly aware of himself except as in a 
far-away vision of a sluggish, insignificant crea- 
ture struggling across the tossed-up crust of 
an old, incomprehensible world. The secret of 
his content in that long, leisurely ramble had 
been that ever by a scarcely realised effort it 
had not lain in the direction of Widderstone. 
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And now, as he sat hungrily devouring his 
breakfast on the table in the kitchen, with the 
daybreak comforting his eyes, he thought with 
a positive mockery of that poor old night-thing 
he had driven inch by inch into the safe -keeping 
of his pink and white drawing-room. Don 
Quixote, Poe, and Rousseau — they were familiar 
but not very significant labels to a mind that had 
found very poor entertainment in reading. But 
they were at least representative enough to set 
him wondering which of their infiuences it was 
that had infiated with such a gaseous heroism the 
Lawford of the night before. He thought of Sheila 
with a not unkindly smile, and of the rest. ^T 
wonder what they’ll do?” had been a question 
almost as much in his mind during these last few 
hours as had “What am I to do?” in the first bout 
of his “visitation.” But the “they” was not very 
precisely visualised. He saw Sheila, and Harry, 
and dainty pale-blue Mrs. Lovat, and cautious old 
Wedderbum, and Danton, and Craik, and cheery, 
gossipy Dr. Sutherland, and the verger, Mr. 
Dutton, and Critchett, and the gardener, and Ada, 
and the whole vague populous host that keep one 
as definitely in one’s place in the world’s economy 
as a firm-set pin the camphored moth. What his 
place was to be only time could show. Meanwhile 
there was in this loneliness at least a respite. 

Solitude! — he bathed his weary bones in it. 
He laved his eyelids in it, as in a woodland brook 


The Understanding of Sympathy 217 

after the heat of noon. He sat on in calmest 
reverie till his hunger was satisfied. Then, 
scattering out his last crumbs to the birds from the 
barred window, he climbed up-stairs again, past his 
usual bedroom, past his detested guest room, up 
into the narrow sweetness of Alice’s, and flinging 
himself on her bed fell into a long and dreamless 
sleep. 

By ten next morning Lawford had bathed and 
dressed. And at half-past ten he got up from 
Sheila’s fat little French dictionary and his 
memoirs to answer Mrs. Gull’s summons on the 
area bell. The little woman stood with arms 
folded over an empty and capacious bag, with an 
air of sustained melancholy on her friendly face. 
She wished him a very nervous “Good morning,” 
and dived down into the kitchen. The hours 
dragged slowly by in a silence broken only by an 
occasional ring at the bell. About three she 
emerged from the house and climbed the area steps 
with her bag hooked over her arm. He watched 
the little black figure out of sight, watched a man in 
a white canvas hat ascend the steps to push a blue 
printed circular through the letter-box. It had 
begun to rain a little. He returned to the break- 
fast-room and with the window wide open to the 
rustling coolness of the leaves, edged his way very 
slowly across from line to line of the obscure 
French print. 

Sabathier none the less, and in spite of his im- 


2I8 


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intelligible literariness, did begin to take shape and 
consistency. The man himself, breathing and 
thinking, began to live for Lawford even in those 
few, half-articulate pages, though not in quite so 
formidable a fashion as Mr. Bethany had summed 
him up. But, as the west began to Hghten with 
the declining sun, the same old disquietude, the 
same old friendless and foreboding ennui stole over 
Lawford’s solitude once more. He shut his books, 
placed a candlestick and two boxes of matches on 
the hall table, lit a bead of gas, and went out into 
the rainy-sweet streets again. 

At a mean little barber’s with a pole above his 
lettered door he went in to be shaved. And a few 
steps further on he sat down at the crumb-littered 
counter of a little baker’s shop to have some tea. 
It pleased him almost to childishness to find how 
easily he could listen and even talk to the oiled and 
crimpy little barber, and to the pretty, consump- 
tive-looking, print-dressed baker’s wife. What- 
ever his face might now be conniving at, the 
Arthim Lawford of last week could never have 
hobnobbed so affably with his social ^ inferiors.” 

For no reason in the world, unless to spend a 
moment or two longer in the little baker’s shop, he 
bought sixpenny-worth of cakes. He watched 
them as they were deposited one by one in the bag, 
and even asked for one sort to be exchanged for 
another, blushing a little at his excuse, ^‘They 
were so very delicious.” 


The Understanding of Sympathy 219 

He climbed out of the shop, and paused on the 
wooden doorstep. ^‘Do you happen to know Mr. 
Herbert’s?” he said. 

The baker’s wife looked up at him with clear, 
reflective eyes. ^‘Mr. Herbert’s? — that must be 
some little way off, sir. I don’t know any such 
name, and I know most, just round about like.” 
Well, yes, it is,” said Lawford, rather foolishly; 
hardly know why I asked. It’s past the 
churchyard at Widderstone.” 

^^Oh, yes, sir,” she encoiuraged him. 

A big, wooden-looking house.” 

^'Really, sir. Wooden!” 

Lawford looked at her face, but could find 
nothing more to say, so he smiled again, rather 
absently, and ascended into the street. 

He sat down outside the churchyard gate on the 
very bank where he had in the sourness of the net- 
tles first opened Sabathier’s memoir. The world lay 
still beneath the pale sky. Presently the little fat 
rector walked up the hill, his wrists still showing be- 
neath his sleeves. Lawford meditatively watched 
him pass by. A little boy with a switch, a tiny 
nose, and a swinging gallipot, his cheeks lit with 
the sunset, followed soon after. Lawford beckoned 
him with his finger and held out the bag of tarts. 
He watched him, half incredulous of his prize, and 
with many a cautious look over his shoulder, 
pass out of sight. For a long while he sat alone, 
only the evening birds singing out of the greenness 


220 


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and silence of the churchyard. What a haunting, 
inexplicable riddle life was ! 

Colour suddenly faded out of the light streaming 
between the branches. And depression, always 
lying in ambush of the novelty of his freedom, 
began like mist to rise above his restless thoughts. 
It was all so devilish empty — this raft of the world 
floating under evening’s shadow. How many ser- 
mons had he listened to, enriched with the simile 
of the ocean of life. Here it was, come home to 
roost. He had fallen asleep, ineffectual sailor 
that he was, and a thief out of the cloudy deep had 
stolen oar and sail and compass, leaving him 
adrift amid the riding of the waves. 

“Are they worth, do you think, quite a penny? ” 
suddenly inquired a quiet voice in the silence. 
He looked up into the almost colourless face, the 
grey eyes beneath the clear narrow brows. 

“I was thinking,” he said, “what a curious thing 
life is, and wondering ” 

“The first half is well worth the penny — its 
originality! I can’t afford twopence. So you 
must give me what you were wondering.” 

Lawford gazed rather blankly across the twilight 
fields. “I was wondering,” he said with an oddly 
naive candour, “how long it took one to sink.” 

“They say, you know,” Grisel replied solemnly, 
“drowned sailors float midway, suffering their sea 
change; purgatory. But what a splendid penny- 
worth 1 All pure philosophy I ’ ’ 


The Understanding of Sympathy 221 


“ ‘ Philosophy ! ’ ” said Lawford ; I am a perfect 
fool. Has your brother told you about me?’^ 

She glanced at him quickly. We had a talk.” 

“Then you do know — ?” He stopped dead, 
and turned to her. “You really realise it, looking 
at me now?” 

“I realise,” she said gravely, “that you look 
even a little more pale and haggard than when I 
saw you first the other night. We both, my 
brother and I, you know, thought for certain 
you ’d come yesterday. In fact, I went into 
Widder stone in the evening to look for you, 
knowing your nocturnal habits!” She glanced 
again at him with a kind of shy anxiety. 

“Why — why is your brother so — why does he 
let me bore him so horribly?” 

“Does he? He ’s tremendously interested; but 
then, he ’s pretty easily interested when he ’s 
interested at all. If he can possibly twist anything 
into the slightest show of a mystery, he will. But, 
of course, you won't, you can't take all he says 
seriously. The tiniest pinch of salt, you know. 
He 's an absolute fanatic at talking in the air. 
Besides, it does n't really matter much.” 

“In the air?” 

“I mean if once a theory gets into his head — the 
more far-fetched, so long as it 's original, the better 
— it flowers out into a positive miracle of incred- 
ibilities. And of course you can rout out evidence 
for anything under the sun from his dingy old 


222 


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folios. Why did he lend you that particular 
book?” 

“Didn’t he tell you that, then?” 

“He said it was Sabathier.” She seemed to 
think intensely for the merest fraction of a moment 
and turned. “Honestly, though, I think he 
immensely exaggerated the likeness. As for . . .” 

He touched her arm, and they stopped again, 
face to face. “Tell we what difference exactly 
you see,” he said. “ I am quite myself again now, 
honestly; please tell me just the very worst you 
think.” 

“I think, to begin with,” she began, with exag- 
gerated candour, “his is rather a detestable face.” 

“And mine?” he said gravely. 

“Why — very troubled; oh, yes — but his was like 
some bird of prey. Yours — what mad stuff to 
talk like this! — not the least symptom, that I can 
see, of — why, the ‘prey,’ you know.” 

They had come to the wicket in the dark, thorny 
hedge. “Would it be very dreadful to walk on a 
little — just to finish?” 

“Very,” she said, turning as gravely at his side. 

“What I wanted to say was — ” began Lawford, 
and forgetting altogether the thread by which he 
hoped to lead up to what he really wanted to say, 
broke off lamely; “I should have thought you 
would have absolutely despised a coward.” 

“ It would be rather absurd to despise what one 
so horribly well understands. Besides, we were n’t 


The Understanding of Sympathy 223 

cowards — we were n’t cowards a bit. My child- 
hood was one long, reiterated terror — nights and 
nights of it. But I never had the pluck to tell any 
one. No one so much as dreamt of the company 
I had. Ah, and you did n’t see either that my 
heart was absolutely in my mouth, that I was 
shrivelled up with fear, even at sight of the fear 
on your face in the dark. There ’s absolutely 
nothing so catching. So, you see, I do know a 
little what nerves are ; and dream too, sometimes, 
though I don’t choose charnel-houses if I can get a 
feather bed. A coward ! May I really say that to 
ask my help was one of the bravest things in a man 
I ever heard of. Bullets — that kind of courage — 
no real woman cares twopence for bullets! An 
aunt of mine stared a man right out of the house 
with the thing in her face. Anyhow, whether I 
may or not, I do say it. So now we are quits.” 

“Will you — ” began Lawford and stopped. 
“What I wanted to say was,” he jerked on, “it is 
sheer horrible hypocrisy to be talking to you like 
this — though you will never have the faintest 
idea of what it has meant and done for me. I 
mean . . . And yet, and yet, I do feel when just 
for the least moment I forget what I am, and that 
isn’t very often, when I forget what I have be- 
come and what I must go back to — I feel that I 
have n’t any business to be talking with you at all. 
* Quits!’ And here I am, an outcast from decent 
society. Ah, you don’t know ” 


224 


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She bent her head and laughed under her breath. 
^‘You do really stumble on such delicious com- 
pliments. And yet, do you know, I think my 
brother would be immensely pleased to think you 
were an outcast from decent society if only he 
could be thought one too. He has been trying 
half his life to wither decent society with neglect 
and disdain — ^but it does n’t take the least notice. 
The deaf adder, you know. Besides, besides; 
what is all this meek talk? I detest meek talk — 
gods or men. Surely in the first and last resort all 
we are is ourselves. Something has happened; 
you are jangled, shaken. But to us, believe me, 
you are simply one of fewer friends — and I think, 
after struggling up Widderstone Lane hand in 
hand with you in the dark, I have a right to say 
Triends’ — than I could count on one hand. What 
are we all if we only realised it ? We talk of dignity 
and propriety, and we are like so many children 
playing with knucklebones in a giant’s scullery. 
Come along, he will, some supper-time — for us 
each in turn — and how many even will so much as 
look up from their play to wave us good-bye? that ’s 
what I mean — the plot of silence we are all in. 
If only I had my brother’s lucidity, how much 
better I would have said all this! It is only, 
believe me, that I want ever so much to help you, 
if I may — even at risk, too,” she added rather 
shakily, '‘of having that help quite snubbed.” 

The lane had narrowed. They had climbed the 


The Understanding of Sympathy 225 

arch of a little stone bridge that spanned the 
smooth, dark Widder. A few late starlings were 
winging far above them. Darkness was coming on 
apace. They stood for a while looking down into 
the black, flowing water, with here and there the 
mild silver of a star dim leagues below. “I am 
afraid,” said Grisel, looking up quietly, ^^you have 
led me into talking most pitiless nonsense. How 
many hours, I wonder, did I lie awake in the dark 
last night, thinking of you? Honestly, I shall 
never, ne^er forget that walk. It haunted me, 
on and on.” 

Thinking of me? Do you really mean that? 
Then it was not all imagination ; it was n't just the 
drowning man clutching at a straw?” 

The grey eyes questioned him. ^^You see,” he 
explained in a whisper, as if afraid of being over- 
heard, “it — it came back again, and — I don’t 
mind a bit how much you laugh at me! I had 
been asleep, and had had a most awful dream, one 
of those dreams that seem to hint that some day 
that will be our real world, that some day we may 
awake where dreaming then will be of this; and I 
woke, and there was a tremendous knocking going 
on downstairs. I knew there was no one else in 
the house ” 

“No one else in the house ! And you like this ? ’ ’ 

“Yes,” said Lawford rather stolidly, “they were 
all out, as it happened. And, of comse,” he went 
on quickly, “there was nothing for me to do but 

IS 


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simply to go down and open the door. And yet, 
do you know, at first I simply could n^t move. I 
lit a candle, and then — then somehow I got to 
know that waiting for me was just — but there,” 
he broke off half -ashamed, ^T must n't bother you 
with all this morbid stuff. Will yoiu* brother be 
in now, do you think?” 

“ My brother will be in, and, of course, expecting 
you. But as for ‘bother,’ believe me — ^well, did I 
quite deserve it?” She stooped towards him. 
“You lit a candle — and then?” 

They turned and walked slowly up the hill. 

“It came again.” 

“It?” 

“That — that presence, that shadow. I don’t 
mean, of course, it ’s a real shadow. It comes, 
does n’t it, from — from within? As if from out of 
some imheard-of hiding place, where it has been 
lurking for ages and ages before one’s childhood; 
at least, so it seems to me now. And yet although 
it does come from within, there it is, too, in front of 
you, before your eyes, feeding even on your fear, 
just watching, waiting for — What nonsense all 
this must seem to you!” 

“Yes, yes; and then?” 

“Then, you must remember the poor old boy 
had been knocking all this time — ^my old friend — 
Mr. Bethany, I mean — knocking and calling 
through the letter-box, thinking I was in extremis^ 
or something; then — how shall I describe it? — 


The Understanding of Sympathy 227 

well, you came, your eyes, your face, as clear as 
when, you know, the night before last, we went 
up the hill together. And then ...” 

And then?” 

**And then, we — ^you and I, you know — simply 
drove him down- stairs, and I could hear myself 
grunting as if it were really a physical effort; we 
drove him, step by step, down-stairs. And — ” 
He laughed outright, and boyishly continued his 
adventure. ”What do you think I did then, 
without the ghost of a smile, too, at the idiocy of 
the thing? I locked the poor beggar in the draw- 
ing-room. I saw him there, as plainly as I ever 
saw anything in my life, and the furniture glim- 
mering, though it was pitch dark : I can’t describe 
it. It all seemed so desperately real, absolutely 
vital then. It all seems so meaningless and im- 
possible now. And yet, although I am utterly 
played out and done for, and however absurd it 
may sounds I would n’t have lost it ; I would n’t 
go back for any bribe there is. I feel just as if 
a great bundle had been rolled off my back. Of 
course, the queerest, the most detestable part of 
the whole business is that it — the thing on the 
stairs — was this” — he lifted a grave and haggard 
face towards her again — “or rather he 

pointed with his stick towards the starry church- 
yard. “Sabathier,” he said. 

Again they had stopped together before the 
white gate, and this time Lawford pushed it 


228 


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open, and followed his companion up the narrow 
path. 

She paused with her hand on the bell. ^‘Was 
it my brother who actually put that horrible idea 
into your mind? — about Sabathier?^^ 

**Oh, no, not really put it into my head,’* said 
Lawford hollowly. ‘‘He only found it there; lit 
it up.” 

She laid her hand lightly on his arm . ‘ ‘ Whether 

he did or not,” she said, with an earnestness that 
was almost an entreaty, “of course, you must agree 
that we every one of us have some such experience 
— that kind of visitor, once, at least, in a lifetime.” 

“Ah, but,” began Lawford, turning forlornly 
away, “you did n’t see, you can’t have realised — 
the change.” 

She pulled the bell almost as if in some inward 
triumph. “But don’t you think,” she suggested, 
“that that, like the other, might be, as it were, 
partly imagination too? If now you thought 
hack ” 

But a little old woman had opened the door, 
and the sentence, for the moment, was left 
unfinished. 


CHAPTER XVII 


A NEW EXPLANATION 

There was no one in the room, and no light, when 
they entered. For a moment Grisel stood by the 
open window, looking out. Then she turned im- 
pulsively. “My brother, of course, will ask you, 
too,” she said; “we had made up our minds to do 
so if you came again; but I want you to promise 
me now that you won’t dream of going back to- 
night. That surely would be tempting — well, 
not Providence. I could n’t rest if I thought you 
might be alone like that again.” Her voice died 
away into the calling of the waters. A light 
moved across the dingy old rows of books and as 
his sister turned to go out Herbert appeared in the 
doorway, carrying a green-shaded lamp, with an 
old leather quarto under his arm. 

“Ah, here you are!” he said. “I guessed you 
had probably met.” He drew up, burdened, 
before his visitor. But his clear, black glance, 
instead of wandering off at his first greeting had 
intensified. And it was almost with an air of 
absorption that he turned away. He dumped his 
229 


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book on to a chair and it turned over with scattered 
leaves on to the floor. He put the lamp down and 
stooped after it, so that his next words came up 
muffled, and as if the remark had been forced out 
of him. “You don’t feel worse, I hope?” He 
got up and faced his visitor for the answer. And 
for the moment Lawford stood considering his 
symptoms. 

“No,” he said almost gaily; “I feel enormously 
better.” 

But Herbert’s long, oval, questioning eyes be- 
neath the sleek black hair were still fixed on his 
face. “ I am afraid, my dear fellow,” he said, with 
something more than his usual curiously indifferent 
courtesy, “the struggle has frightfully pulled you 
to pieces.” 

“The question is,” answered Lawford, with a 
kind of tired yet whimsical melancholy in his voice, 
“though I am not sure that the answer very much 
matters — what ’s going to put me together again? 
It ’s the old story of Humpty Dumpty, Herbert. 
Besides, one thing you said has stuck out in a quite 
curious way in my memory. I wonder if you will 
remember?” 

“What was that?” said Herbert with unfeigned 
curiosity. 

“Why, you said even though Sabathier had 
failed, though I was still my own old stodgy self, 
that you thought the face — the face, you know, 
might work in. Somehow, sometimes, I think it 


231 


A New Explanation 

has. It does really rather haunt me. In that 
case — well, what then?” Lawford had himself 
listened to this involved explanation much as one 
watches the accomplishment of a difficult trick, 
marvelling more at its completion at all than at 
the difficulty involved in the doing of it. 

*^*Work in,’” repeated Herbert, like a rather 
hlase child confronted with a new mechanical toy ; 
‘‘did I really say that? well, honestly, it was n’t 
bad; it ’s what one would expect on that hypothesis. 
You see, we are only different, as it were, in our 
differences. Once the foot ’s over the threshold, 
it ’s nine points of the law ! But I don’t remember 
saying it.” He quite boyishly and naively con- 
fessed it : “ I say such an awful lot of things. And 
I ’m always changing my mind. It ’s a standing 
joke against me with my sister. She says the 
recording angel will have two sides to my account : 
Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays; and Tues- 
days, Thursdays, and Saturdays — diametrically 
opposite convictions, and both wrong! Sundays 
I am all things to all men. As for Sabathier, by 
the way, I do want particularly to have another 
go at him. I ’ve been thinking him over, and I ’m 
afraid in some ways he won’t quite wash. And 
that reminds me, did you read the poor chap?” 

“I just grubbed through a page or two ; but most 
of my French was left at school. What I did do, 
though, was to show the book to an old friend of 
ours — my wife’s and mine — just to skim — a Mr. 


232 


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Bethany. He 's an old clergyman — our vicar, in 
fact.’’ 

Herbert had sat down, and with eyes slightly 
narrowed was listening with peculiar attention. 
He smiled a little magnanimously. ‘‘His verdict, 
I should think, must have been a perfect joy.” 

‘‘He said,” said Lawford, in his rather low 
monotonous voice, ‘‘he said it was precious poor 
stuff, that it reminded him of patchouli ; and that 
Sabathier — the print I mean — looked like a foxy 
old roue^ They were, I think, his exact words. 
We were alone together, last night.” 

“You don’t mean that he simply did n’t see the 
faintest resemblance?” 

Lawford nodded. “But then,” he added sim- 
ply, “whenever he comes to see me now he leaves 
his spectacles at home.” 

And at that, as if at some preconcerted signal, 
they both went off into a simple shout of laughter, 
unanimous and sustained. 

But this first wild bout of laughter over, the 
first real bursting of the dam, perhaps, for years, 
Lawford found himself at a lower ebb than ever. 

“You see,” he said presently, and while still his 
companion’s face was smiling around the remem- 
brance of his laughter, like ripples after the splash 
of a stone, “ Bethany has been absolutely my sheet- 
anchor right through. And I was — it was — ^you 
can’t possibly realise what a ghastly change it 
really was. I don’t think any one ever will.” 


233 


A New Explanation 

Herbert opened his hand and looked reflectively 
into the palm before allowing himself to reply. 
*‘I wonder, you know; I have been wondering a 
good deal; simply taking the other point of view 
for a moment; was it? I don’t mean ‘ghastly’ 
exactly (like, say, smallpox, G.P.I., elephantiasis), 
but was it quite so complete, so radical, as in the 
first sheer gust of astonishment you fancied?” 

Lawf ord thought on a little further. “You know 
how one sees oneself in a passion — why, how a child 
looks — the whole face darkened and drawn and 
possessed? That was the change. That ’s how it 
seems to come back to me. And something, some- 
body, dodging behind the eyes. Yes; more that 
than even any excessive change of feature, except, 
of course, that I also seemed — Shall I ever forget 
that first cold, stifling stare into the looking-glass ! 
I certainly was much darker, even hair. But 
I ’ve told you all this before,” he added wearily, 
“and the scores and scores of times I ’ve thought 
it ! I used to sit up there in the big spare bedroom 
my wife put me up in, simply gloating. My 
flesh seemed nothing more than an hallucination : 
there I was, haunting my body, an old grinning 
tenement, and all that I thought I wanted, and 
could n’t do without, all I valued and prided my- 
self on — stacked up in the drizzling street below. 
Why, Herbert, our bodies are only glass or cloud. 
They melt, don’t they, like wax in the sun once 
we ’re out. But those first few days don’t make 


234 


The Return 


very pleasant thinking. Friday night was the 
first, when I sat there like a twitching waxwork, 
soberly debating between Bedlam here and Bedlam 
hereafter. I even sometimes wonder whether its 
very repetition has not dulled the memory or 
distorted it. My wife,” he added ingenuously, 

seems to think there are signs of a slight im- 
provement — a going back, I mean. But I *m 
not sure whether she meant it.” 

Herbert surveyed his visitor critically. ^‘You 
say Mark,’” he said but surely, Lawford, your 
hair now is nearly grey; well-flecked at least.” 

Although the remark carried nothing compara- 
tively of a shock with it, yet it seemed to Lawford 
as if an electric current had passed over his scalp, 
coldly stirring every hair upon his head. But 
somehow or other it was easier to sit quietly on, to 
express no surprise, to let them do or say what they 
liked. “Well,” he retorted with an odd, crooked 
smile, “you must remember I am a good deal older 
than I was last Saturday. I grew grey in the 
grave, Herbert.” 

“But it ’s like this, you know,” said Herbert, 
rising excitedly, and at the next moment, on re- 
flection, quietly reseating himself. “How many 
of your people actually saw it? How many owned 
to it as being as bad, as complete, as you made out? 
I don’t want for a moment to cut right across 
what you said last night — our talk — but there 
are two sides to every question, and as often as 


A New Explanation 235 

not the less conspicuous has sounder roots. 
That ’s all.’' 

“ I really think, do you know, I would rather not 
go over the detestable thing again. Not many; 
my wife, though, and a man I know called Danton, 
who — who ’s prejudiced. After all, I have myself 
to think about too. And right through, right 
through — oh, I own that; oh, there wasn’t the 
least doubt of that — they all in their hearts knew 
it was I. They knew I was behind. I could feel 
that absolutely, always; it ’s not just eyes and 
ears we use, there ’re we ourselves to consider, 
though God alone knows what that means. But 
the password was there, as you might say ; and they 
all knew I knew it, all — except” — ^he looked up as 
if in bewilderment — “except just one, a poor old 
lady, a very old friend of my mother’s, whom I — I 
Sabathiered ! ” 

‘ ‘ Whom — you — Sabathiered, ’ ’ repeated Her- 
bert carefully, with infinite relish, looking sidelong 
at his visitor. “And it is just precisely that . . .” 
But at that moment his sister appeared in the 
doorway to say that supper was ready. And it 
was not until Herbert was actually engaged in 
carving a cold chicken that he followed up his 
advantage. “Mr. Lawford, Grisel,” he said, “has 
just enriched our jaded language with a new verb 
— to Sabathier. And if I may venture to define 
it in the presence of the distinguished neologist 
himself, it means, ‘To deal with histrionically’; 


236 


The Return 


or, rather, that ’s what it will mean a couple of 
hundred years hence. For the moment it means, 
‘ To act under the influence of subliminilisation * ; 
^To perplex, or bemuse or estrange with other- 
ness, Do tell us, Lawford, more about the little old 
lady ! ” He passed with her plate a little meaning- 
ful glance at his sister, and repeated, ^‘Do!” 

^‘But I Ve been plaguing your sister enough 
already. You ’ll wish . . . . ” he began, and 
turned his tired-out eyes towards those others 
awaiting them so frankly they seemed in their 
perfect friendliness a rest from all his troubles. 
‘‘You see,” he went on, “what I kept on thinking 
and thinking of was to get a quite unbiassed and 
unprejudiced view. She had known me for years, 
though we had not actually met more than once or 
twice since my mother’s death. And there she 
was sitting with me at the other end of just such 
another little seat as” — he turned to Herbert — 
“as ours, at Widderstone. It was on Bewley 
Common: I can see it all now; just before sunset. 
And I simply turned and asked her in a kind of 
whining, affected manner if she remembered me; 
and when after a long time she came round to 
owning that to all intents and purposes she did not 
— I professed to have made a mistake in recog- 
nising her, I think,” he added, glancing up from 
one to the other of his two strange friends, “I 
think it was the meanest trick I can remember.” 

“H’m,” said Herbert solemnly; “I wish I had as 


237 


A New Explanation 

sensitive a conscience. But as your old friend 
did n’t recognise you, who ’s the worse? As for 
her not doing so, just think of the difference a few 
years make to a man, and any severe shock. 
Life wears so infernally badly. Who, for that 
matter, does not change, even in character; and 
yet who professes to see it? Mind, I don’t say 
in essence! But then how many of the human 
ghosts one meets does one know in essence? One 
does n’t want to. It would be positively cataclys- 
mic. And that ’s what brings me round to feel, 
Lawford, if I may venture to say so, that you may 
have brooded a little too keenly on — on your own. 
Tell any one you feel ill ; he will commiserate with 
you to positive nausea. Tell any priest your soul 
is in danger ; will he wait for proof ? It ’s mise- 
reres and penances world without end. Tell any 
woman you love her; will she, can she, should she, 
gainsay you? There you are! The cat ’s out of 
the bag, you see. My sister and I sat up half the 
night talking the thing over. I said I ’d take the 
plunge. I said I ’d risk appearing the crassest, 
contradictoriest wretch that ever drew breath. 
I don’t deny that what I hinted at the other night 
must seem in part directly contrary to what I ’m 
going to say now.” He wheeled his black eyes 
as if for inspiration, and helped himself to salad. 
^‘It’s this,” he said. “Isn’t it possible, isn’t 
it even probable that being ill, and overstrung, 
moping a little over things more or less out of the 


238 


The Return 


common ruck, and sitting there in a kind of trance 
— is n’t it possible that you may have very largely 
imagined the change: hypnotised yourself into 
believing it much worse — more profound, radical, 
acute — and simply absolutely hypnotising others 
into thinking so, too? Christendom is just be- 
ginning to rediscover that there is such a thing as 
faith, that it is just possible that, say, megrims or 
melancholia may be removed at least as easily as 
mountains. The converse, of course, is obvious 
on the face of it. A man fails because he thinks 
himself a failure. It ’s the men that run away that 
lose the battle. Supposing then, Lawford” — he 
leaned forward, keen and suave — “supposing you 
have been and ‘ Sabathiered ’ yourself!’’ 

Lawford had grown accustomed during the last 
few days to finding himself gazing out like a child 
into reality, as if from the windows of a dream. 
He had in a sense followed this long, loosely 
stitched, preliminary argument; he had at least 
in part realised that he sat there between two clear 
friendly minds acting in the friendliest and most 
obvious collusion; but he was incapable of fixing 
his attention very closely on any single fragment 
of Herbert’s apology, or of rousing himself into 
being much more than a dispassionate and not 
very interested spectator of the little melodrama 
that Fate, it appeared, had at the last moment 
decided rather capriciously to twist into a farce. 
He turned with a smile to the face so keenly fixed 


239 


A New Explanation 

and enthusiastic with the question it had so labor- 
iously led up to: “But surely, I don’t quite 
see ...” 

Herbert lifted his glass as if to his visitor’s 
acumen and set it down again without tasting it. 
“Why, my dear fellow,’’ he said triumphantly, 
“even a dream must have a peg. Yours was this 
unforgetable old suicide. Candidly now, how 
much of Sabathier was actually yours? In spite 
of all that that fantastical fellow, Herbert, said 
last night, dead men don't tell tales. The last 
place in the world to look for a ghost is where his 
traitorous bones lie crumbling. Good heavens! 
think what irrefutable masses of evidence there 
would be at our finger-tips if every tombstone 
hid its ghost! No; the fellow just arrested you 
with his creepy epitaph; an epitaph, mind you, 
that is in a literary sense distinctly fertilising. It 
catches one’s fancy in its own crude way, as pages 
and pages of infinitely more complicated stuff 
take possession of, germinate, and sprout in one’s 
imagination in another way. We are all psychical 
parasites. Why, given his epitaph, given the 
surroundings, I wager any sensitive consciousness 
could have guessed at his face ; and guessing, as it 
were, would have feigned it. What do you think, 
Grisel?” 

“ I think, dear, you are talking absolute non- 
sense ; what do they call it — ‘ darkening counsel ’ ? 
It ’s ‘the hair of the dog,’ Mr. Lawford.” 


240 


The Return 


“Well, then, you see,” said Herbert over a 
hasty mouthful, and turning again to his victim — 
“then, you see, when you were just in the pink of 
condition to credit any idle tale you heard, then / 
came in. What, with the least impetus, can one 
not see by moonlight? The howl of a dog turns 
the midnight into a Brocken ; the branch of a tree 
stoops out at you like Beelzebub crusted with 
gadflies. I ’d, mind you, sipped of the deadly old 
Huguenot too. I 'd listened to your innocent 
prattle about the child kicking his toes out on 
death’s cupboard door ; what more likely thing in 
the world, then, than that with that moon, in that 
packed air, I should have swallowed the bait whole, 
and seen Sabathier in every crevice of your skin? 
I don’t say there was n’t any resemblance ; it was 
for the moment extraordinary; it was even when 
you were here the other night distinctly arresting. 
But now (poor old Grisel, I ’m nearly done) all I 
want to say is this: that if we had the Hoxy old 
roue ’ here now, and Grisel played Paris between 
the three of us, she ’d hand over the apple not to 
you, but to me.” 

“I don’t quite see where poor Paris comes in,” 
suggested Grisel meekly. 

“No, nor do I,” said Herbert. “All that I 
mean, sagacious child, is, that Mr. Lawford no 
more resembles the poor wretch now than I resem- 
ble the Apollo Belvidere. If you had only heard 
my sister scolding me, railing at me for putting 


241 


A New Explanation 

such ideas into your jangled head! They don’t 
affect me one iota. I am, I suppose, what is usu- 
ally called rather imaginative (not, by all that ’s 
miraculous, of course, the creative variety 1) ; and 
all that that pseudo kind of stuff means is that I 
can sup with the devil, spoon for spoon, and could 
sleep in Bluebeard’s linen-closet without turning 
a hair. You, if I am not very much mistaken, 
are not much troubled with that very unprofitable 
quality, and so, I suppose, when a crooked and 
bizarre fancy does edge into your mind it roots 
there.” And that said, not without some little 
confusion, and a covert glance of inquiry at his 
sister, Herbert made all the haste he could to 
catch up the course that his companions had 
already finished. 

If only, Lawford thought, this insufferable weari- 
ness would lift a while he could enjoy the quiet, 
the easy, heedless talk, and this very friendly 
topsy-turvy effort to ease his mind and soothe 
his nerves, and even take an interest again in his 
case. 

^‘You see,” he said, turning to Grisel, don’t 
think it really very much matters how it all came 
about. I never could believe it would last. It 
may perhaps — some of it at least may be fancy. 
But then, what isn’t? What is trustworthy? 
And now your brother tells me my hair ’s turning 
grey. I suppose I have been living too slowly, 
too sluggishly, and they thought it was high time 

i6 


242 


The Return 


to stir me up.’' He saw with extraordinary 
vividness the low, panelled room ; the still, listening 
face; the white muslin shoulders and dark hair; 
and the eyes that seemed to recall some far-off 
desolate longing for home and childhood. It was 
all a dream. That was the end of the matter. 
Even now, perhaps, his tired old stupid body was 
lying hunched up, drenched with dew upon the 
little old seat under the mist- wreathed branches. 
Soon it would bestir itself and wake up and go off 
home — home to Sheila, to the old deadly round 
that once had seemed so natural and inevitable, to 
the old dull Lawford — eyes and brain and heart. 

They retirmed up the dark old staircase to Her- 
bert’s book-room, and he talked on to very quiet 
and passive listeners in his own fantastic endless 
fashion. And ever and again Lawford would find 
himself intercepting , fleeting and anxious glances 
at his face, glances almost of remorse and pity; 
and thought he detected beneath this irresponsible 
contradictory babble an unceasing effort to clear 
the sky, to lure away too pressing memories, to 
put his doubts and fears completely to rest. 

Herbert even went so far as to plead guilty, when 
Grisel gave him the cue, of having a little height- 
ened and over-coloured his story of the restless 
phantasmal old creature that haunted their queer, 
wooden, quite hauntable old house. And when 
they rose, laughing and yawning, to take up their 
candles, it was, after all, after a rather animated 


243 


A New Explanation 

discussion, with many a hair-raising ghost story 
brought in for proof between brother and sister, 
as to exactly how many times that snuff-coloured 
spectre had made his appearance; and, with less 
unanimity still, as to the precise manner in which 
he was in the habit of making his precipitant exit. 

^‘You do at any rate acknowledge, Grisel, that 
the old creature does appear, and that you saw 
him yourself step out into space when you were 
sitting down there under the willow shelling peas. 
I Ve seen him twice for certain, once rather hazily ; 
Sallie saw him so plainly she asked his business: 
that 's five. I resign.’' 

‘‘Acknowledge!” said Grisel; “of course I do. 
I ’d acknowledge anything in the world to save 
argument. Why, I don’t know what I should do 
without him. If only, now, Mr. Lawford would 
give him a fair chance to show himself; reading 
quietly here about ten minutes to one, or shelling 
peas even, if he prefers it. If only he ’d stay long 
enough for that! Would n’t it be the very thing 
for both of them!” 

“Of course,” said Herbert cordially, “the very 
thing.” 

Lawford rather mournfully shook his head. 

But he needed little persuasion to stay at least 
one night. The prospect of that long, solitary 
walk, of that tired, stupid stooping figure dragging 
itself along the interminable country roads with 
only a house more hateful to him than a cage to a 


244 


The Return 


rat at the end of it, had made at least going home 
an impossibility. ^Tt is not — ^it is n’t, I swear it — 
the other that keeps me back,” he had solemnly 
assured the friend that smiled her real relief at his 
acceptance, “but — ^if you only knew how empty 
it ’s all got now ; all reason gone even to go on at 
all.” 

“But doesn’t it follow!” she had cried almost 
gaily. “After two such terrific, splendid exor- 
cisms! Swept and garnished, you know. And 
don’t I just envy you the looking roimd for new 
lodgers again! What a vivid seven it will be!” 

He said good night ; shut to the latched door of 
his long, low room, ceiling with rafters close under 
the steep roof, its brown walls hung with quiet, 
dark, pondering, and beautiful faces looking 
gravely across at him. And with his candle 
in his hand he sat down on the bedside. All 
speculation was gone. The noisy clock of his brain 
had quite run down again. He turned towards 
the old oval looking-glass on the dressing-table 
without the faintest stirring of interest, suspense, 
or anxiety. What did it matter what a man 
looked like? — a now familiar but how enfeebled 
and deprecating voice seemed to say. He knew 
assuredly that a change had come. Even Sheila 
had noticed it. And since then what had he not 
gone through! But terror, and strife, and rage 
had died down and away. What now was here 
instead seemed of little moment, so far at least as 


245 


A New Explanation 

this world was concerned. At last he rose with an 
effort, crossed the uneven floor, and looked in un- 
movedly on what was his own poor face come back 
to him: changed, indeed, almost beyond belief 
from the sleek, self-satisfied, genial yet languid 
Arthur Lawford of the past years, and haunted 
yet with some faint trace of the set and icy sharp- 
ness, and challenge, and affront of the dark ad- 
venturer, but that — how immeasurably dimmed 
and blunted and faded ! He had expected to find 
it so. Would it — the thought vanished across his 
mind — would it have been as immistakably there 
had he come hot-foot, fearing, expecting to find 
the other ? 

He hardly knew how long he stood there, 
leaning on his hands, surveying almost listlessly 
in the candle-light that lined, bedraggled, grey, 
and hopeless countenance, those dark-socketed, 
smouldering eyes, whose pupils even now were so 
dilated that a casual glance would have failed to 
detect the least hint of any iris. “It must have 
been something pretty bad you were, you know, 
or something pretty bad you did,“ they seemed 
to be trying to say to him, “to drag us down to 
this.” 

He knelt down by force of habit to say his 
prayers; but no words came. Well, between 
earthly friends a betrayal such as this would have 
caused a lifelong estrangement and hostility. 
The God the old Lawford used to pray to would 


246 


The Return 


forgive him, he thought wearily, if just for the 
present he was a little too sore at heart to play 
the hypocrite. But if, while kneeling, he said 
nothing, he saw a good many things, in such 
tranquillity and clearness as the mere eyes of the 
body can share but rarely with their sisters of the 
imagination. And now it was Alice who looked 
mournfully out of the dark at him; and now the 
little old charwoman, Mrs. Gull, with her bag 
hooked over her arm, climbed painfully up the 
area steps ; and now it was the lean, vexed face of a 
friend, nursing some restless and anxious grievance 
against him — Mr. Bethany; and then and ever 
again it was the face of one who seemed pure 
dream and fantasy and yet ... he listened 
intently and fancied even now he could hear the 
voices of brother and sister talking quietly and 
circumspectly together in the room beneath. * 


CHAPTER XVIII 
lawford's perplexity 

A QUIET knocking on the door aroused him in the 
long, tranquil bedroom; and Herbert’s head was 
poked into the room. ^‘There’s a bath behind 
that door over there,” he whispered, ‘'or if you 
Hke I ’m off for a bathe in the Widder. It ’s a 
luscious day. Shall I wait? All right,” and the 
head was withdrawn. “Don’t put much on,” 
came the voice at the panel; “we ’ll be home 
again in twenty minutes.” 

The green and glory of the morning, it seemed, 
must have been seized overnight by spiders and 
the dew. Everywhere the gleaming nets were 
hung, and everywhere there rose a tiny splendour 
from the dewdrops, so clear and pure and change- 
able it seemed with their fire and colour they shook 
a tiny crystal music in the air. Herbert led 
the way along a clayey downward path beneath 
hazels tossing softly together their twigs of nuts, 
until they came out into a rounded hollow that, 
mounded with thyme, sloped gently down to the 
green banks of the Widder. The water poured 
247 


248 


The Return 


like clearest glass beneath a rain of misty 
sunbeams. 

“My sister always says that this is the very dell 
Boccaccio had in his mind’s eye when he wrote the 
Decamerone, There really is something almost 
classic in those pines. And I ’d sometimes swear 
with my eyes just out of the water I Ve seen 
Dryads half in hiding peeping between those 
beeches. Good Lord, Lawford, what a world we 
wretched moderns have missed ! ^ , I * 

The water was marvellously cdfd, and seemed to 
Lawford, as it rilled tingling over his shoulders, 
and as he plunged his night-distorted eyes beneath 
its blazing surface, as if indeed it was charged 
with some strange, unearthly enchantment to wash 
away in its icy clearness even the memory of the 
dull and tarnished days behind him. If one 
could but tie up anyhow that stained bundle of 
inconsequent memories called life, and fling it into 
a cupboard remoter even than Bluebeard’s, and 
lock the door, and drop the quickly-rusting key 
into these living waters! He dressed himself 
with window thrown open to the blackbirds and 
thrushes, and the occasional shrill, solitary whis- 
tling of a robin. But, like the sour-sweet fragrance 
of the brier, its wandering, desolate burst of music 
had power to waken memory, and carried him 
instantly back to that first aimless descent into 
the evening gloom of Widderstone from which it 
was in vain to hope ever to climb again. Surely 


Lawford’s Perplexity 249 

never such a ghoulish face looked out on its man 
before as that which confronted him as with 
borrowed razor he stood shaving those sunken 
chaps, that angular chin ! And even now beneath 
the lantern of broad daylight, just as within that 
other face had lurked the tmdeniable ghost and 
presence of himself, so now beneath these simken 
features seemed to float, tenuous as smoke, 
scarcely less elusive than a dream, between eye 
and object, the sinister darkness of the face that 
in those two bouts with fear he had by some strange 
miracle managed to repel. Work in,” the chance 
phrase came back. It had worked in in sober 
earnest; and so far as the living of the next few 
weeks went, surely it might prove an ally without 
which he simply could not conceive himself as 
struggling on at all. 

But quite as dexterous minds as even restless 
Sabathier’s had him just now in safe and kindly 
keeping. All the quiet October morning Herbert 
kept him talking and stooping over his extraor- 
dinary collection of books. 

“You see,” he explained to Lawford, standing 
amid a positive archipelago of precious “finds,” 
with his foot hoisted on to a chair and a patched-up, 
sea-stained folio on his knee, “I honestly detest 
the mere give and take of what we are fools enough 
to call life. I don’t deny Life’s there” — ^he swept 
his hand towards the open window — “in that 
frantic Tophet we call London; but there ’s no 


250 


The Return 


focus, no point of vantage. Even a scribbler only 
gets it piecemeal and through a dulled medium. 
We learn to read before we know how to see; 
we swallow our tastes, convictions, and emotions 
whole; so that nine tenths of the world’s nectar 
is merely honey dew.” He smiled pleasantly into 
the fixed vacancy of his visitor’s face. “And so 
I ’ve just gone on,” he continued amiably, “collect- 
ing just this particular kind of stuff — ^what you 
might call riff-raff. There ’s not a book here, 
Lawford, that has n’t at least a glimmer of the real 
thing in it — just Life, seen through a living eye, 
and felt. As for literature, and style, and all 
that gallimaufry, don’t fear for them if your 
author has the ghost of a hint of genius in his 
making.” 

“But surely,” said Lawford, trying for the 
twentieth time to pretend to himself that these 
endless books carried the faintest savour of the 
delight to him which they must, he rather forlornly 
supposed, shower upon Herbert, “surely genius is 
a very rare thing!” 

“Rare! the world simply swarms with it. But 
before you can bottle it up in a book it ’s got to be 
articulate. Just for a single instant imagine your- 
self Falstaff, and if there were n’t hundreds of 
Falstaffs in every generation, to be ensamples of 
his ungodly life, he ’d be as dead as a doornail to- 
morrow — imagine yourself Falstaff, and being so, 
sitting down to write Henry IV. or The Merry 


Lawford’s Perplexity 251 

Wives! It ’s simply preposterous. You would n’t 
be such a fool as to waste the time. A mere 
Elizabethan scribbler comes along with a gift of 
expression and an observant eye, lifts the bloated 
old tippler clean out of life, and swims down the 
ages as the greatest genius the world has ever seen. 
Whereas, surely, though you must n’t let me bore 
you with all this piffle, it ’s Falstaff is the genius, 
and W. S. merely a talented reporter. (Of course, 
mind you, when we come to the Sonnets, that ’s a 
very different cry.) But Hamlet, Lear, Macbeth, 
Mercutio — they live on their own, as it were. The 
newspapers are full of them, if we were only the 
Shakespeares to see it. You jostle them at every 
street comer. There ’s a Polonius in every first- 
class railway carriage, and as many Juliets as there 
are boarding-schools. What the devil are yoUj 
my dear chap, but genius itself, with all the world 
brand new upon your shoulders? And who ’d 
have thought it of you ten days ago? It ’s simply 
and solely because we ’re all, poor wretches, 
dumb — dumb as butts of Rhenish; dumb as drum- 
merless drums. Here am I, my dear fellow, trick- 
ling out this — this whey that no more expresses 
me than Tupper does Sappho. But that ’s what 
I want to mean. How jolly rich everything is, 
if you only stick to life! Here it is packed away 
behind these rotting covers, just the real thing, 
no respectable stodge; no mere parasitic stuff; 
not more than a dozen poets; scores of outcasts 


252 


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and vagabonds — and the real thing in vagabonds 
is pretty rare in print, I can tell you. We ’re all 
sodden with facts, drugged with the second-hand, 
and barnacled with respectability until — until the 
touch comes. Goodness knows where from; but 
there ’s no mistaking it; oh, no!” 

“But what,” said Lawford imeasily, “what on 
earth do you mean by the touch?” 

“I mean when you cease to be a puppet 
only and sit up in the gallery too. When you 
squeeze through to the other side. When you get 
a living inkling. When you become articulate to 
yourself.” 

“I am awfully stupid,” Lawford murmured, 
“but even now I don’t really follow you a bit. 
But when, as you say, you do become articulate 
to yourself, what happens then?” 

“Why, then,” said Herbert with a shrug almost 
of despair, “then begins the weary tramp back. 
One by one drop off the truisms, and the Grundy- 
isms, and all the still-bom claptrap of the market- 
place sloughs off. Then one can seriously begin 
to think about saving one’s soul.” 

“Saving one’s soul,” groaned Lawford; “why, 
I am not even sure of my own body yet.” He 
walked slowly over to the window and with every 
thought in his head as quiet as doves on a sunny 
wall, stared out into the garden of green things 
growing, leaves fading, and falling water. “I tell 
you what,” he said, turning irresolutely, “ I wonder 


Lawford’s Perplexity 253 

if you could possibly find time to write me out a 
translation of Sabathier. My French is much too 
hazy to let me really get at the chap. He ’s gone 
now; but I really should like to know exactly 
what kind of stuff he has left behind.’* 

‘‘Oh, Sabathier!” said Herbert, laughing. 
“What do you think of that, Grisel?” he asked, 
turning to his sister, who at that moment had 
looked in at the door. “Here ’s Mr. Lawford 
asking me to make a translation of Sabathier! 
Lunch, Lawford.” 

Lawford sighed. And not until he had slowly 
descended half the narrow, uneven stairs that led 
down to the dining-room did he fully realise the 
guile of a sister that could induce a hopeless book- 
worm to waste a whole morning over the stupidest 
of companions, simply to keep his tired-out mind 
from rankling, and give his Sabathier a chance to 
go to roost. 

“I think, do you know,” he managed to blurt 
out at last — “I think I ought to be thinking 
of getting home again. The house is empty — 
and ” 

“You shall go this evening,” said Herbert, “if 
you really must insist on it. But honestly, Law- 
ford, we both think that after what the last few 
days must have been, it is merely common-sense 
to take a rest. How can you possibly rest with a 
dozen empty rooms echoing every thought you 
think? There ’s nothing more to worry about; 


254 


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you agree to that. Send your people a note saying 
that you are here, safe and sound. Give them a 
chance of lighting a fire, and driving in the fatted 
calf. Stay on with us just the week out!" 

Lawford turned from one to the other of the 
two friendly faces. But what was dimly in his 
mind refused to express itself. think, you 
know, I — " he began falteringly. 

“But it ’s just this thinking that ’s the deuce — 
this preposterous habit of having continually to 
make up one's mind. Off with his head, Grisel! 
My sister 's going to take you for a picnic; we 
go every other fine afternoon; and you can argue 
it out with her." 

Once alone again with Grisel, however, Lawford 
found talking quite unnecessary. Silence seemed 
to fall between them as quietly and restfully as 
evening flows into night. They walked on slowly 
through the fading woods, and when they had 
reached the top of the hill that sloped down to the 
dark and foamless Widder they sat down in the 
honey-scented sunshine on a knoll of heather and 
bracken, and Grisel lighted the little spirit-kettle 
she had brought with her, and busied herself very 
methodically over making tea. 

That done, she clasped her hands round her 
knees, and sat now gossiping, now silent in the 
pale autumnal beauty. There was a bird wistfully 
twittering in the branches overhead, and ever and 
again a withered leaf would circle down from the 


Lawford’s Perplexity 255 

motionless beech boughs arched in their stillness 
beneath the thin blue sky. 

'‘Men, you know,” she began again suddenly, 
starting out of reverie, “really are absurdly blind; 
and just a little bit absurdly kindly stupid. How 
many times have I been at the point of laughing 
out at my brother’s deliciously naive subtleties! 
But you do, you will understand, Mr. Lawford, 
that he was, that we are both ‘doing our best’ — 
to make amends?” 

“I understand — I do indeed — a tenth part of 
all your kindness.” 

“Yes, but that ’s just it — that horrible word 
‘kindness’! If ever there were two utterly self- 
absorbed people, without a trace, with an absolute 
horror, of kindness, it is just my brother and I. 
It ’s most of it false and most of it useless. Surely 
we all must take what comes in this topsy- 
turvy world. I believe in saying out: — that the 
more one thinks about life the worse it becomes. 
There are only two kinds of happiness in this world 
— a wooden post’s and Prometheus’s. And who 
ever heard of any one having the impudence to 
be kind to Prometheus? As for a miserable ‘me- 
dium’ like me, not quite a post and leagues and 
leagues from even envying a Prometheus, she ’s 
better for the powder without the jam. But 
that ’s all nothing. What I can’t help thinking — 
and it ’s not a bit giving my brother away, because 
we both think it — that it was partly our thought- 


256 


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lessness that added at least something to — to 
the rest. It was perfectly absurd. He saw you 
were ill; he saw — ^he must have seen even in that 
first Sunday talk — that your nerves were all askew. 
And who doesn’t know what ^nerves’ means 
nowadays! And yet he deliberately chattered. 
He loves it — ^just at large, you know, like me. 
I told him before I came out that I intended, if I 
could, to say all this. And now it ’s said you ’ll 
please forgive me for going back to it.” 

‘ ‘ Please don’t talk about forgiveness. But when 
you say he chattered, you mean about Sabathier, 
of course. And that, you know, I don’t care a 
fig for now. We can settle all that between our- 
selves — ^him and me, I mean. And now tell me 
candidly again — Is there any ^prey’ in my face 
now?” 

She looked up fleetingly into his eyes, leant back 
her head and laughed. *Prey ’ 1 there never was 
a glimpse.” 

“And * change’?” Their eyes met again in an 
infinitely brief, infinitely bewildering argument. 

“Really, really, scarcely perceptible,” she as- 
sured him, “except, of course, how horribly, 
horribly ill you look. And that only seems to 
prove to me you must be hiding something else. 
No illusion on earth could — coiild have done that 
to your face.” 

“You think, I know,” he persisted, “that I 
must be persuaded and cosseted and humoured. 


Lawford’s Perplexity 257 

Yes, you do; it 's my poor old sanity that 's really 
in both your minds. Perhaps I am — not abso- 
lutely sound. Anyhow, I Ve been watching it in 
your looks at each other all the time. And I can 
never, never say, never tell you what you have 
done for me. But you see, after all, we did win 
through; I keep on telling myself that. So that 
now it 's purely from the most selfish, practical 
motives that I want you to be perfectly frank with 
me. I have to go back, you know; and some of 
them, one or two of my friends I mean, are not 
all on my side. Think of me as I was when you 
came into the room, three centuries ago, and you 
t tuned and looked, frowning at me in the candle- 
light ; remember that and look at me now ! What 
is the difference? Does it shock you? Does it 
make the whole world seem a trick, a sham? 
Does it simply sour your life to think such a thing 
possible? Oh, the hours I Ve spent gloating on 
Widderstone’s miserable mask of skin and bone, 
as I was saying to your brother only last night, 
and never knew until they shuffled me that the 
old self too was nothing better than a stiffing 
suffocating mask.” 

^‘But don’t you see,” she argued softly, turning 
her face away a little, ‘‘you were a stranger then 
(though I certainly did n’t mean to frown). And 
then a little while after we were, well, just human 
beings, shoulder to shoulder, and if friendship does 
not mean that, I don’t know what it does mean. 


17 


258 


The Return 


And now, you are — well, just you: the you, you 
know, of three centuries ago ! And if you mean to 
ask me whether at any precise moment I have been 
conscious that this you I am now speaking to was 
not the you of last night, or of that dark climb up 
the hill, why, it is simply frantic to think it could 
ever be necessary to say over and over again. No. 
But if you mean, Have you changed else? All I 
could answer is. Don’t we all change as we grow 
to know one another? What were just features, 
what just dingily represents one, as it were, are 
forgotten, or rather get remembered. Of course, 
the first glimpse is the landscape under lightning 
as it were. But afterwards is n’t it surely like the 
alphabet to a child ; what was first a queer angular 
scrawl becomes A, and is ever after A, undis- 
tinguished, half -forgotten, yet standing at last for 
goodness knows what real wonderful things — or 
for just the dry bones of soulless words? Is that 
it?” She stole a sidelong glance into h^*s brooding 
face, leaning her head on her hand. 

^‘Yes, yes,” came the rather dissatisfied reply. 
do agree; perfectly. But then, you see — I told 
you I was going to talk of nothing but myself — 
what did at first happen to me was something 
much worse, and, I suppose, something quite 
different from that.” 

“And yet, didn’t you tell us, that of all your 
friends not one really denied in their hearts your 
— what they would call, I suppose — ^your identity ; 


Lawford's Perplexity 259 

except that poor little offended old lady. And 
even she, if my intuition is worth a penny piece, 
even she when you go soon and talk to her will own 
that she did know you, and that it was not because 
you were a stranger that she was offended, but 
because you so ungenerously pretended to be one. 
That was a little mad, now, if you like!’^ 

“Oh, yes,” said Lawford, “I am going to ask 
her forgiveness. I don’t know what I did n’t vow 
to take her for a peace-offering if the chance should 
ever come — and the courage — to make my peace 
with her. But now that the chance has come, 
and I think the courage, it is the desire that ’s 
gone. I don’t seem to care either way. I feel 
as if I had got past making my peace with any 
one.” 

But this time no answer helped him out. 

• “After all,” he went plodding on, “there is 
more than just the mere day to day to consider. 
And one doesn’t realise that one’s face actually 
is one’s fortune without a shock. And that that 
gone, one is, as yotu* brother said, just like a bee 
come back to the wrong hive. It undermines,” 
he smiled rather bitterly, “one’s views, rather. 
And it certainly sifts one’s friends. If it had n’t 
been just for my old” — ^he stopped dead, and 
again pushed slowly on — “if it had n’t been for otu* 
old friend, Mr. Bethany, I doubt if we should now 
have had a soul on our side. I once read some- 
where that wolves always chase the old and the 


26 o 


The Return 


wounded out of the pack. And after all, what do 
we do? Where do we keep the homeless and the 
insane? And yet, you know,’’ he added ruminat- 
ingly, ^‘it is not as if mine was ever a particularly 
lovely or lovable face; while as for the poor wretch 
behind it, well, I really cannot see what meaning, 
or life even, he had before ” 

^‘Before?” 

Lawford met bravely the clear whimsical eyes. 
^‘Before I was Sabathiered.” 

Grisel laughed outright. 

“You think,” he retorted almost bitterly, “you 
think I am talking like a child.” 

“Yes,” she sighed cheerfully, “I was quite 
envjdng you.” 

“ Well, there I am,” said Lawford inconsequently. 
“And now; well, now, I suppose, the whole thing ’s 
to begin again. I can’t help beginning to wonder 
what the meaning of it all is ; why one’s duty should 
always seem so very stupid a thing. And then, 
too, what can there be on earth that even a buried 
Sabathier could desire?” He glanced up in a 
really animated perplexity at the still, dark face 
turned in the evening light towards the darkening 
valley. And perplexity deepened into a dis- 
quieted frown — like that of a child who is roused 
suddenly from a day-dream by the half -forgotten 
question of a stranger. He turned his eyes almost 
furtively away as if afraid of disturbing her; and 
for a while they sat in silence. ... At last he 


Lawford’s Perplexity 261 

turned again almost shyly. I hope some day 
you will let me bring my daughter to see you.’' 

^‘Yes, yes,” said Grisel eagerly; '‘we should 
both love it, of course. Is n’t it curious? — I 
simply knew you had a daughter. Sheer intuition ! ’ ’ 

“I say ‘some day,”’ said Lawford; “I know, 
though, that that some day will never come.” 

“Wait! just wait!” replied the quiet, confident 
voice, “that will come too. One thing at a time, 
my dear friend. You ’ve won your old self back 
again; you ’U win your old love of life back again 
in a little while ; never fear. Oh, don’t I know that 
awful Land’s End after illness; and that longing, 
too, that gnawing longing, too, for Ultima Thule! 
So, it ’s a bargain between us that you bring your 
daughter soon.” She busied herself over the tea- 
things. “And, of course,” she added, as if it were 
an afterthought, looking across at him in the pale 
green stmlight as she knelt, “you simply won’t 
think of going back to-night. . . . Solitude, I really 
do think, solitude just now would be absolute 
madness. You ’ll write to-day and go, perhaps, 
to-morrow?” 

Lawford looked across in his mind at his square 
ungainly house, full-fronting the afternoon sim. 
He tried to repress a shudder. “I think, do you 
know, I ought to go to-day.” 

“Well, why not? Why not? Just to reassure 
yourself that all ’s well. And come back here to 
sleep. If you ’d really promise that I ’d drive 


262 


The Return 


you in. I love it. There ’s the jolliest little 
governess-cart, we sometimes hire for our picnics. 
May I? You Ve no idea how much easier in our 
minds my brother and I would be if you would. 
And then to-morrow, or at any rate the next 
day, you shall be surrendered, whole and in your 
right mind. There, that ’s a bargain too! Now 
we must hurry. 


CHAPTER XIX 


THE EMPTY HOUSE 

Herbert himself went down to order the 
govemess-cart, and packed them in with a rug. 
And in the dusk Grisel set Lawford down at the 
comer of his road and drove on to an old book- 
seller’s with a commission from her brother, prom- 
ising to return for him in an hour. Dust and a few 
straws lay at rest as if in some abstruse arrange- 
ment on the stones of the porch just as the last 
faint whirling gust of sunset had left them. Shut 
lids of sightless indifference seemed to greet the 
wanderer from the curtained windows. He opened 
the door and went in. For a moment he stood in 
the vacant hall ; then he peeped first into the blind- 
drawn dining-room, faintly, dingily sweet, like 
some old empty wine-bottle. He went softly on 
a few paces and just opening the door looked in 
on the faintly glittering twilight of the drawing- 
room. But the congealed stump of candle that 
he had set in the comer as a final rancorous 
challenge to the beaten Shade was gone. He 
slowly and deliberately ascended the stairs, con- 
263 


264 


The Return 


scions of a peculiar sense of ownership of what 
in even so brief an absence had taken on so queer 
a look of strangeness. It was almost as if he 
might be some lone heir come in the rather mourn- 
ful dusk to view what melancholy fate had almost 
unexpectedly bestowed on him. 

^‘Work in’" — what on earth else could this chill 
sense of strangeness mean? Would he ever free 
his memory from that one haphazard, haimting 
hint? And as he stood in the doorway of the big, 
calm room, which seemed even now to be stirring 
with the restless shadow of these last few far away 
days; now pacing sullenly to and fro; now sitting 
hunched up to think; and now lying impotent in a 
vain, hopeless endeavour only for the breath of a 
moment to forget — he awoke out of reverie to find 
himself smiling at the thought that a changed face 
was practically at the mercy of an incredulous 
world, whereas a changed heart was no one’s 
deadly dull affair but its owner’s. The merest 
breath of pity even stole over him for the Sabathier 
who after all had dared ; and had needed, perhaps, 
nothing like so arrogant and merciless a coup de 
grdce to realise that he had so ignominiously failed. 

^‘But there, that’s done!” he exclaimed out 
loud, not without a tinge of regret that theories, 
however brilliant and bizarre, could never now 
be anything else — that now, indeed, that the 
symptoms had gone, the “malady,” for all who 
had not been actually admitted into the shocked 


26s 


The Empty House 

circle, was become nothing more than an inanely 
^‘tair^ story: stuffing not even savoury enough 
for a goose. Exactly how wide, he wondered, 
would Sheila’s discreet, shocked circle prove? 
He stood once more before thelooking-glass, hear- 
ing again Grisel’s words in the still, green shadow 
of the beech-tree, ^‘Except, of course, horribly, 
horribly ill.” ^^What a fool, what a coward she 
thinks I am!” 

There was still nearly an hour to be spent in this 
great bam of faded interests. He lit his candle 
and descended into the kitchen. A mouse went 
scampering to its hole as he pushed open the door. 
The memory of that ravenous morning meal 
nauseated him. It was sour and very still here; 
he stood erect; the air smelt faintly of earth. In 
the breakfast-room the bookcase still swung open. 
Late evening mantled the garden; and in sheer 
ennui again he sat down at the table, and turned 
for a last not unfriendly hobnob with his poor 
old friend Sabathier. He would take the thing 
back. Herbert, of course, was going to translate 
it for him. Now if the patient old Frenchman 
had stormed Herbert instead — that surely would 
have been something like a coup I Those frenzied 
books! The absurd talk of the man! Herbert 
was perfectly right — he could have entertained 
fifty old Huguenots without turning a hair. “I’m 
such an awful stodge.” 

He turned the woolly leaves over very slowly. 


266 


The Return 


He frowned impatiently, and from the end back- 
wards turned them over again. Then he laid the 
book softly down on the table and sat back. He 
stared with narrowed lids into the flame of his 
quiet, friendly candle. Every trace, every shred 
of portrait and memoir were gone. Once more, 
slowly, pimctiliously, he examined page by page 
the blurred and unfamiliar French, the sooty heads, 
the long, lean noses, the baggy eyes passing like 
flgures in a peepshow one by one under his hand, 
to the last fragmentary and dexterously mended 
leaf. Yes, Sabathier was gone. Quite the old 
slow Lawford smile crept over his face at the dis- 
covery. And yet it was a smile a little sheepish, 
too, as he thought of Sheila’s quiet vigilance. 

And the next instant he had looked up sharply, 
with a sudden peculiar shrug and a kind of CTy, 
like the first thin cry of an awakened child, in his 
mind. Without a moment’s hesitation he climbed 
swiftly up-stairs again to the big sepulchral bed- 
room. He pressed with his finger-nail the tiny 
spring in the looking-glass. The empty drawer flew 
open. There were even finger-marks in the dust. 

Yet, strangely enough, beneath all the clashing 
thoughts that came flocking into his mind as he 
stood with the empty drawer in his hand was a 
wotmding yet still a little amused pity for his old 
friend Mr. Bethany. So far as he himself was 
concerned the discovery — well, he would have 
plenty of time to consider everything that could 


267 


The Empty House 

possibly now concern himself. Anyhow, it could 
only simplify matters. He remembered waking 
to that old wave of sickening horror on that first 
unhappy morning; he remembered the keen yet 
owlish old face blinking its deathless friendliness 
at him, and the steady pressure of the cold skinny 
hand. As for Sheila, she had never done anything 
by halves; certainly not when it came to throwing 
over a friend no longer necessary to one’s social 
satisfaction. But she would edge out cleverly, 
magnanimously, triumphantly enough, no doubt, 
when the day of reckoning should come, the day 
when, her nets wide-spread, her bait prepared, he 
must stand up before her outraged circle and prove 
himself her clear and lawful husband, perhaps even 
to the very imprint of his thumb. 

*^Poor old thing!” he said again; and this time 
his pity was shared almost equally between both 
witnesses to Mr. Bethany’s ingenuous little docu- 
ment, the loss of which had fallen so softly and 
pathetically that he felt only ashamed of having 
discovered it so soon. 

He shut back the tell-tale drawer, and after 
trying to collect his thoughts in case anything 
should have been forgotten, he turned with a deep 
trembling sigh to descend the stairs. But on the 
landing he drew back at the sound of voices, and 
then a footstep. Soon came the sound of a key 
in the lock. He blew out his candle and leant 
listening over the balusters. 


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The Return 


“Who’s there?” he called quietly. 

“Me, sir,” came the feeble reply out of the 
darkness. 

“What is it, Ada? What have you come for?” 

“ Only, sir, to see that all was safe, and you were 
in, sir.” 

“Yes,” he said. “All’s safe; and I am in. 
What if I had been out?” It was like dropping 
tiny pebbles into a deep well — ^so long after came 
the answering feeble splash. 

“Then I was to go back, sir.” And a moment 
after the discreet voice floated up with the faintest 
tinge of effrontery out of the hush. “Is that Dr. 
Ferguson, sir?” 

“No, Ada; and please tell your mistress from me 
that Dr. Ferguson will not be in till late.” A keen 
but rather forlorn smile passed over his face. 
“He ’s dining with friends at Holloway. But of 
course if she should want to see him he will call 
to-morrow at any hour at Mrs. Lovat’s. And 
—Ada!” 

“Yes, sir?” 

“Say that I ’m a little better; your mistress will 
be relieved to hear that I ’m a little better; still 
not quite myself say, but, I think, a little better.” 

“Yes, sir; and I ’m sure I ’m very glad to hear 
it,” came fainter still. 

“What voice was that I heard just now?” 

“Miss Alice’s, sir; but she came quite against 
my wishes, and I hope you won’t repeat it, sir. 


269 


The Empty House 

She promised if she came that mistress should n't 
know. I was only afraid she might disturb you, 
or — or Dr. Ferguson. And did you say, sir, that 
I was to tell mistress that he was coming back?" 

Ah, that I don’t know; so perhaps it would be 
as well not to mention him at all. Is Miss Alice 
there?" 

“ I said I would tell her if you were alone. But 
I hope you ’ll understand that it was only because 
she begged so. Mistress has gone to St. Peter’s 
bazaar; and that ’s how it was." 

* ‘ I quite understand. Beckon to her ! ’ ’ 

There came a hasty step in the hall and a hurried 
murmur of explanation. Lawford heard her call 
as she ran up the stairs ; and the next moment he 
had Alice’s hand in his and they were groping 
together through the gloaming back into the soli- 
tude of the empty room again. 

“You won’t cry out, dear," he heard himself 
imploring, “you ’ll just hold tight to that clear 
common-sense, my dear ; and above all you won’t 
tell. It must be our secret; a dead, dead secret 
from every one, even from your mother, for just 
a little while ; just a mere two days or so — in case. 
I ’m — I ’m better, dear." 

He fumbled with the little box of matches, 
dropped one, broke another ; but at last the candle- 
flame dipped, brightened, and with door shut and 
the last paleness of dusk at the window Lawford 
turned and looked at his daughter. She stood 


270 


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with eyes wide open, like the eyes of a child walk- 
ing in its sleep; then twisted her fingers more 
tightly within his. ^‘Oh, dearest, how ill, how ill 
you look!” she whispered; ^‘but there, never mind 
— never mind ! It was all a miserable dream, then ; 
it won’t, it can’t come back? I don’t think I 
could bear its coming back. And mother told me 
such curious things ; as if I were a child and under- 
stood nothing. And even after I knew that you 
were you — I mean before I sat up here in the dark 
to see you — she said that you were gone and would 
never come back ; that a terrible thing had hap- 
pened — a disgrace which we must never speak of ; 
and that all the other was only a pretence to 
keep people from talking. But I did not believe 
then, and how could I believe afterwards?” 

There, never mind now, dear, what she said. 
It was all meant for the best, perhaps. But here 
I am; and not nearly so ill as I look, Alice; and 
there ’s nothing more to trouble ourselves about ; 
not even if it should be necessary for me to go 
away for a time. And this is our secret, mind; 
she doesn’t dream; just a dead secret between 
you and me.” 

They sat for a while without speaking or stirring. 
And faintly along the hushed road Lawford heard 
in the silence a leisurely indolent beat of little 
hoofs approaching, and the sound of wheels. A 
sudden wave of feeling swept over him. He took 
Alice’s quiet, loving face in his hands and kissed 


The Empty House 271 

her passionately. ‘‘Do not so much as think of 
me yet, or doubt, or question: only love me, 
dearest. And soon — and soon 

“We ’ll just begin again, just begin again, won’t 
we? all three of us together, just as we used to be. 
I did n’t mean to have said all those horrid things 
about mother. She was only dreadfully anxious 
and meant everything for the best. You ’ll let 
me tell her soon?’’ 

The haggard face tiirned slowly, listening. “I 
hear, I understand, but I can’t think very clearly 
now, Alice ; I can’t dear ; my miserable old tangled 
nerves. I just stumble along as best I can. 
You ’ll understand better when you get to be a 
poor old thing like me. We must do the best we 
can. And of course you ’ll see, Dillie, how awfully 
important it is not to raise false hopes. You 
understand? I must n’t risk the least thing in 
the world, must I? And now good-bye; only for 
a few hours now! And not a word, not a word to 
a single living soul.” 

He extinguished the candle again, and led the 
way to the top of the stairs. “Are you there, 
Ada?” 

“Yes, sir,” answered the same quiet, imperturb- 
able voice from under the black straw brim. Alice 
went slowly down, but at the foot of the stairs, 
looking out into the cold, blue, lamplit street she 
paused as if at a sudden recollection, and ran 
hastily up again. 


272 


The Return 


“There was nothing more, dear?” she said, 
leaning back to peer up. 

“ ‘Nothing more,* dear? what?** 

She stood panting a little in the darkness, listen- 
ing to some cautious yet uneasy thought that 
seemed to haunt her mind. “I thought — it 
seemed there was something we had not said, 
something I could not understand. But there, it 
is nothing! You know what a fanciful old silly I 
am. You do love me? Quite as much as ever?** 
“More, sweetheart, more!** 

“Good-night again, then; and God bless you, 
dear!** 

The outer door closed softly, the footsteps died 
away. Lawford still hesitated. He took hold of 
the stairs above his head as he stood on the land- 
ing, and leaned his head upon his hands, striving 
calmly to disentangle the perplexity of his thoughts. 
His pulses were beating in his ear with a low, 
muffled roar. He looked down between the blinds 
to where against the blue of the road beneath the 
straggling yellow beams of the lamp stood the little 
cart and drooping, shaggy pony, and Grisel sitting 
quietly there awaiting him. He shut his eyes as 
if in hope by some convulsive effort of mind to 
break through this subtle glass-like atmosphere 
of dream that had stolen over consciousness, and 
blotted out the significance, almost the meaning 
of the past. He turned abruptly. Empty as the 
empty rooms around him, unanswering were mind 


The Empty House 273 

and heart. Life was a tale told by an idiot — 
signifying nothing. 

He went slowly down-stairs. And even then the 
doubt came: Would he ever come back? Who 
knows? he thought; and again stood pondering, 
arguing, denying. At last he seemed to have 
come to a decision. He made his way down-stairs, 
opened and left ajar a long, narrow window in a 
passage to the garden beyond the kitchen. He 
turned on his heel as he reached the gate and 
waved his hand as if in a kind of forlorn mockery 
towards the darkly glittering windows. The 
drowsy pony woke at touch of the whip. 

Grisel lifted the rug and squeezed a little closer 
into the comer. She had drawn a veil over her 
face, so that to Lawford her eyes seemed to be 
dreaming in a little darkness of their own as he 
laid his hand on the side of the cart. ^‘It’s a 
most curious thing,” he said, “but peeping down 
at you just now when the sound of the wheels 
came, a memory came clearly back to me of years 
and years ago — of my mother. She used to come 
to fetch me at school in a little cart like this, and a 
little pony just like this, with a thick dusty coat. 
And once I remember I was simply sick of every- 
thing, a failure, and fagged out, and all that, and 
was looking out in the twilight; I fancy, even, it 
was autumn too. It was a little side staircase 
window ; I was horribly homesick. And she came 
quite unexpectedly. I shall never forget it — 


274 


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the misery, and then, her coming/^ He lifted his 
eyes, cowed with the incessant struggle, and 
watched her face for some time in silence. * ‘ Ought 
I to stay?’’ 

^ T see no ^ought, ’ ’ ’ she said. “No one is there ? ” 

“Only a miserable broken voice out of a broken 
cage — called Conscience.’’- 

“Don’t you think, perhaps, that even that has 
a good many disguises — convention, cowardice, 
weakness, ennui; they all take their turn at hoot- 
ing in its feathers? You must, you really must 
have rest. You don’t know; you don’t see; I do. 
Just a little snap, some one last exquisite thread 
gives way, and then it is all over. You see, I have 
even to try to frighten you, for I can’t tell you 
how you distress me!’’ 

“Why do I distress you? — my face, my story, 
you mean?’’ 

“No; I mean you: your trouble, that horrible 
empty house, and — oh, dear me, yes I your courage 
too!’’ 

^ ‘ Listen ! ’’ said Lawford, stooping forward. He 
could scarcely see the pale, veiled face through 
this mist that had risen up over his eyes. “I 
have no courage apart from you; no courage and 
no hope. Ask me to come! — a stranger with no 
history, no mockery, no miserable rant of a grave 
and darkness and fear behind me. Are we not 
all haunted — every one! That forgotten, and the 
fool I was, and the vacillating, and the pretence 


275 


The Empty House 

— oh, how it all sweeps clear before me; without 
a will, without a hope or glimpse or whisper of 
courage! Be just the memory of my mother, 
the face, ]the friend I Ve never seen; the voice 
that every dream leaves echoing. Ask me to 
come!’’ 

She sat unstirring; and then as if by some un- 
controllable impulse stooped a little closer to him 
and laid her gloved hand on his. 

‘T hear, you know; I hear too,” she whispered. 
‘‘But oh, dear friend, we mustn’t listen. Come 
now. It grows so late.” 

The little village echoed back from its stone walls 
the clatter of the pony’s hoofs. Night had dark- 
ened to its deepest when their lamp shone white 
on the wicket in the hedge. They had scarcely 
spoken. Lawford had simply watched pass by, 
almost without a thought, the arching trees, the 
darkening fields; had watched rise up in a mist 
of primrose light the harvest moon to shine in 
saffron on the faces and shoulders of the few way- 
farers they met, or who passed them by. The still, 
grave face beneath the shadow of its veil had 
never turned, though the moon poured all her flood 
of brilliance upon the dark profile. And once, 
when as if in sudden alarm he had lifted his head 
and looked at her, a sudden doubt had assailed 
him so instantly that he had half put out his hand 
to touch her, and had as quickly withdrawn it, 
lest her beauty and stillness should be, even as the 


276 


The Return 


moment's fancy had suggested, only a far-gone 
memory returned in dream. 

Herbert hailed them from the darkness of an 
open window. He came down, and they talked 
a little in the coolness of the garden. He lit a 
cigarette, and climbed languidly into the cart, 
and drove the drowsy little pony off into the 
moonlight. 


CHAPTER XX 


GLIMPSES OF THE UNREMEMBERED 

It was a quiet supper the three friends sat down 
to. Herbert sat quietly narrowing his eyes over 
his thoughts, which, when the fancy took him, he 
scattered out upon the others^ silence. Lawford 
apparently had not yet shaken himself free from 
the sorcery of the moonlight. His eyes shone 
dark and full like those of a child who has tres- 
passed beyond its hour for bed, and sits marvelling 
at reality in a waking dream. 

Long after they had bidden each other good 
night, long after Herbert had trodden on tiptoe 
with his candle past his closed door, Lawford sat 
leaning on his arms at the open window, staring out 
across the motionless, moonlit trees that seemed 
to stand like draped and dreaming pilgrims, come 
to the peace of their Nirvana at last beside the 
crashing music of the waters. And he himself, the 
self that never sleeps beneath the tides and waves 
of consciousness, was listening, too, almost as 
tmmovedly and unheedingly to the thoughts that 
clashed in conflict through his brain. Why, in 
277 


278 


The Return 


this strange, transitory life, was one the slave of 
these small cares? What if even in that dark 
pit beneath, which seemed to whisper Lethe to the 
tumultuous, swirling waters — ^what if there, too, 
were merely a beginning again, and to seek a 
slumbering refuge there merely a blind, reiterated 
plunge into the heat and tumult of another day? 
Who was that poor, dark, homeless ghoul, Saba- 
thier? Who was this Helen of an impossible 
dream? Her face with its strange smile, her eyes 
with their still pity and rapt courage had taken 
hope away. “Here 's not your rest,” cried one 
insistent voice; “she is the mystery that haunts 
day and night, past all the changing of the restless 
hours. Chance has given you back eyes to see, a 
heart that can be broken. Chance and the stir- 
rings of a long-gone life have tom down the veil 
age spins so thick and fast. Pride and ambition ; 
what dull fools men are! Effort and duty; what 
dull fools men are!” He listened on and on to 
these phantom pleadings and to the rather coarse 
old Lawford conscience gmnting them mercilessly 
down, too weary even to try to rest. 

Rooks at dawn came sweeping beneath the 
turquoise of the sky. He saw their sharp-beaked 
heads turn this way, that way, as they floated on 
outspread wings across the misty world. Except 
for the hoarse roar of the water under the huge 
thin-leafed trees, not a sound was stirring. “One 
thing,” he seemed to hear himself mutter as he 


Glimpses of the Unremembered 279 

turned with a shiver from the morning air, ^‘it 
won’t be for long. You can, at least, poor devil, 
wait the last act out.” If in this foolish, hustling 
mob of the world, hired anywhere and anywhen 
for the one poor dubious wage of a penny — if it 
was only his own small dull part to carry a mock 
spear, and shout huzza! with the rest — there was 
nothing for it, he grunted obstinately to himself, 
shout he would with the loudest. 

He threw himself on to the bed with eyes so 
wearied with want of sleep it seemed they had lost 
their livelong skill in finding it. Not the echo of 
triumph nor even a sigh of relief stirred the torpor 
of his mind. He knew vaguely that what had 
been the misery and madness of the last few days 
was gone. But the thought had no power to 
move him now. Sheila’s good sense, and Mr. 
Bethany’s stubborn loyalty were alike old stories 
that had lost their savour and meaning. Gone, 
too, was the need for that portentous family 
gathering that had sat so often in his fancy dur- 
ing these last few days, around his dining-room 
table, discussing with futile decorum the problem 
of how to hush him up, to muffle him down. Half 
dreaming, half awake, he saw the familiar door 
slowly open and, like the timely hero in a melo- 
drama, his own figure appear before the stricken 
and astonished company. His eyes opened half 
fearfully, and glanced up in the morning twilight. 
Their perplexity gave place to a quiet, almost 


28 o 


The Return 


vacant smile; the lids slowly closed again, and at 
last the lean hands twitched a while in sleep. 

Next morn^g he spent nimmaging among the 
old books, dipping listlessly here and there as the 
tasteless fancy took him, while Herbert sat writing 
with serene face and lifted eyebrows at his open 
window. But the unfamiliar long S’s, the close 
type, and the spelling of the musty old books 
wearied eye and mind. What he read, too, how- 
ever far-fetched, or lively, or sententious, or gross, 
seemed either as if it really were of the same texture 
as what had become his everyday experience, and 
so baffled him with its nearness, or else was only the 
meaningless ramblings of an idle pen. And this, 
he thought to himself, looking covertly up at the 
spruce, clear-cut profile at the window, this is what 
Herbert had called Life! 

Am I interrupting you, Herbert; are you very 
busy?” he asked at last, taking refuge on a chair 
in the far corner. 

Bless me, no; not a bit — not a bit,” said Her- 
bert amiably, laying down his pen. "‘I’m afraid 
the old leather- j ackets have been boring you. It ’s 
a habit, this beastly reading ; this gorge and glint 
and fever all at second-hand — purely a bad habit, 
like morphia, or laudanum. But once in, you 
know there 's no recovery. Anyhow, I ’m neck- 
deep, and to struggle would be simply to drown.” 

“I was only going to say how sorry I am for 
having left Sabathier at home.” 


Glimpses of the Unremembered 281 

My dear fellow — ” began Herbert reassuringly. 

It was only because I wanted so very much to 
have your translation. I get muddled up with 
other things groping through the dictionary.’' 

Herbert surveyed him critically. ‘‘What ex- 
actly is your interest now, Lawford? You don’t 
mean that my old theory has left any sting now? ” 

“No sting ; oh, no ! I was only curious. But you 
yourself still think it really, don’t you?” 

Herbert turned for a moment to the open 
window. 

“I was simply trying then to find a theory to 
fit the facts as you experienced them. But now 
that the facts have gone — and they have, have n’t 
they? — exit, of course, my theory!” 

“I see,” was the cryptic answer. “And yet, 
Herbert,” he solemnly began again, “it has 
changed me ; even in my way of thinking. When 
I shut my eyes now — I only discovered it by 
chance — I see immediately faces quite strange 
to me; or places, sometimes thronged with people; 
and once an old well with some one sitting in the 
shadow. I can’t tell you how clearly, and yet 
it is all altogether different from a dream. Even 
when I sit with my eyes open, I am conscious, as 
it were, of a kind of faint, colourless mirage. In 
the old days, I mean before Widderstone, what I 
saw was only what I ’d seen. Nothing came un- 
called for, unexplained. This makes the old life 
seem so blank ; I really did not know what extra- 


282 


The Return 


ordinarily real things I was doing without. And 
whether for that reason or another, I can’t quite 
make out what really I did want then, and was 
always fretting and striving for. I can see no 
wisdom or purpose in anything now but to get to 
one’s journey’s end as quickly and bravely as one 
can. And even then, even if we do call life a 
journey, and death the inn we shall reach at last 
in the evening at the end of it ; that, too, I feel will 
be only as brief a stopping-place as any other inn 
would be. Our experience here is so scanty and 
shallow — nothing more than the moment of the 
continual present. Surely that must go on, even if 
one does call it eternity. And so we shall all have 
to begin again. Probably Sabathier himself . . . 
But there, what on earth are we, Herbert, when all 
is said? Who is it has — has done all this for us — 
what kind of self? And to what possible end? Is 
it that the clockwork has been wound up and must 
still jolt on a while with jarring wheels? Will it 
never run down, do you think?” 

Herbert smiled faintly, but made no answer. 

'‘You see,” continued Lawford, in the same 
quiet, dispassionate undertone, 'T wouldn’t mind 
if it were only myself. But there are so many of 
us, so many selves, I mean; and they all seem to 
have a voice in the matter. What is the reality 
to this infernal dream?” 

“The reality is, Lawford, that you are fretting 
your life out over this rotten illusion. To go back 


Glimpses of the Unremembered 283 

into the ravages of just your ordinary routine in 
this state would simply be sheer midsummer 
madness. Do be guided by me just this once! 
We ’ll go, all three of us, a good ten-mile walk to- 
day, and thoroughly tire you out. And to-night 
you shall sleep here — a really sound, refreshing 
sleep. Then to-morrow, whole and hale, back 
you shall go; honestly. Here’s Grisel. Now, 
do be persuaded ! It ’s only professional strong 
men should ask questions. Babes like you and 
me must keep to slops.” 

So, though Lawford made no answer, it was 
agreed. Before noon they had set out on their 
walk across the fields. And after rambling on 
just as caprice took them, past reddening black- 
berry bushes and copses of hazel, and flaming 
beech, they sat down to spread out their meal on 
the slope of a hill, overlooking quiet ploughed 
fields and grazing cattle. Herbert stretched him- 
self with his back to the earth, and his placid face 
to the pale, cloudless sky, while Lawford, even 
more dispirited after his walk, wandered up to the 
crest of the hill. 

At the foot of the hill, upon the other side, lay a 
farm and its out-buildings, and a pool of water 
beneath a group of elms. It was vacant in the 
sunlight, and the water vividly green with a scum 
of weed. And about half a mile beyond stood a 
cluster of cottages and an old towered church. 
He gazed idly down, listening vaguely to the wail- 


284 


The Return 


ing of a curlew flitting anxiously to and fro above 
the broken solitude of its green hill. And it 
seemed as if a thin, dark cloud began to be quietly 
withdrawn from over his eyes. Hill, and wailing 
cry, and barn, and water faded out, and he was 
staring, as it were, in an endless stillness at an 
open window against which the sun was beating 
in a bristling torrent of gold, while out of the gar- 
den beyond came the voice of some evening bird 
singing with such an unspeakable ecstasy of grief 
it seemed it must be perched upon the confines 
of another world. The light gathered to a ra- 
diance almost intolerable, driving back with its 
raining beams some memory, forlorn, remorseless, 
remote. His body stood dark and senseless, 
rocking in the air on the hillside as if bereft of 
its spirit. Then his hands were drawn over 
his eyes. He turned unsteadily and made his 
way, as if through a thick, drizzling haze, slowly 
back. 

“What is that — there?” he said almost menac- 
ingly, standing with bloodshot eyes looking down 
upon Herbert. 

“‘That’! — ^what?” said Herbert, glancing up 
startled from his book. “Why, what ’s wrong, 
Lawford?” 

“That,” said Lawford sullenly, yet with a 
faintly mournful cadence in his voice; “those 
fields and that old empty farm — that village over 
there? Why did you bring me here?” 


Glimpses of the Unremembered 285 

Grisel had not stirred. ^‘The village ” 

“Ssh!” she said, catching her brother's sleeve; 
^^that 's Detcham, yes, Detcham.’’ 

Lawford turned wide, vacant eyes on her. He 
shook his head and shuddered. “No, no; not 
Detcham. I know it : indeed I do, but it has gone 
out of my mind. Not Detcham; I Ve been there 
before; don’t look at me! Horrible, horrible! 
It takes me back — I can’t think. I stood there, 
trying, trying ; it ’s all in a blur. Don’t ask me 
— a dream.” 

Grisel leaned forward and touched his hand. 
“Don’t think; don’t try! Why should you? We 
can’t; we must nH go back.” 

Lawford, still gazing fixedly, turned again 
irresolutely towards the steep of the hill. “I 
think, you know,” he said, stooping and whisper- 
ing, ''he would know — the window and the sun 
and the singing. And oh, of course it was too late. 
You understand — too late! And once . . . you 
can’t go back ; oh, no ! You won’t leave me? You 
see, if you go, it would only be all ... I could 
not be quite so alone. But Detcham — Detcham? 
perhaps you will not trust me — tell me? That 
was not the name.” He shuddered violently and 
turned dog-like, beseeching eyes. “To-morrow — 
yes, to-morrow,” he said, “I will promise any- 
thing if you will not leave me now. Once — ” 
But again the thread running so faintly through 
that inextricable maze of memory eluded him. 


286 


The Return 


*‘So long as you won’t leave me now!” he im- 
plored her. 

She was vainly trying to win back her com- 
posure, and could not answer him at once. 

In the evening after supper Grisel sat her guest 
down in front of a big wood fire in the old book- 
room, where, staring into the playing flames, he 
could fall at peace into the almost motionless rev- 
erie which he seemed merely to harass and weary 
himself by trying to disperse. She opened the 
little piano at the far end of the room and played 
on and on as fancy led — Chopin and Beethoven, a 
fugue from Bach, and lovely, forlorn old English 
airs, till the music seemed not only a voice per- 
suading, pondering, and lamenting, but gathered 
about itself the hollow surge of the water and the 
darkness; wistful and clear, as the thoughts of a 
solitary child. Ever and again a log burnt through 
its strength, and, falling amid sparks, stirred, like a 
restless animal, the stillness; or Herbert in his 
corner lifted his head to glance towards his visitor, 
and to turn another page. At last the music, too, 
fell silent, and Lawford stood up with his candle 
in his hand and eyed almost timidly brother and 
sister. His glance wandered slowly round the 
quiet, flame-lit room. 

“You won’t,” he said, stooping towards them as 
if in extreme confidence, “you won’t much notice? 
They come and go. I try not to — to speak. It ’s 


Glimpses of the Unremembered 287 


the only way through. It is not that I don’t 
know they ’re only dreams. But if once the— the 
others thought there had been any tampering” — 
he tapped his forehead meaningly — “here: if once 
they thought that, it would, you know, be quite 
over then. How could I prove . . . ?” He 
turned cautiously towards the door, and with 
laborious significance nodded his head at them. 

Herbert bent down and held out his long hands 
to the fire. “Tampering, my dear chap: that ’s 
what the lump said to the leaven!” 

“Yes, yes,” said Lawford, touching his arm, 
“but you know what I mean, Herbert. Anything 
I tried to do then would be quite, quite hopeless. 
That would be poisoning the wells.” 

They watched him out of the room, and listened 
till quite distinctly in the still night-shaded house 
they heard his door gently close. Then, as if by 
consent, they turned and looked long and ques- 
tioningly into each other’s faces. 

“Then you are not — afraid?” Herbert said 
quietly. 

Grisel gazed steadily on, and almost imper- 
ceptibly shook her head. 

“You mean?” he questioned her; but still he 
had again to read her answer in her eyes. 

“Oh, very well, Grisel,” he said quietly, “you 
know best,” and returned once more to his writing. 

For an hour or two Lawford slept heavily, 
so heavily that when a little after midnight he 


288 


The Return 


woke, with his face towards the uncurtained 
window, though for many minutes he lay there 
confronting all Orion, that from blazing helm to 
flaming dog at heel filled high the glimmering 
square, he could not lift or stir his cold and leaden 
limbs. He rose at last and threw off the burden 
of his bedclothes, and rested a while, as if freed 
from the heaviness of an unrememberable night- 
mare. But so clear was his mind and so extra- 
ordinarily refreshed he seemed in body that sleep 
for many hours would not return again. And he 
spent almost all the remainder of the lagging 
darkness pacing softly to and fro; one face only 
before his eyes, the one sure thing, the one thing 
unattainable in a world of phantoms. 

Herbert waited on in vain for his guest next 
morning, and after wandering up and down the 
mossy lawn at the back of the house, went off 
cheerfully at last alone for his dip. When he 
returned Lawford was in his place at the breakfast 
table. He sat on, moody and constrained, until 
even Herbert’s haphazard talk trickled low. 

“I fancy my sister is nursing a headache,” he 
said at last, “but she ’ll be down soon. And I ’m 
afraid from the looks of you, Lawford, your night 
was not particularly restful.” He felt his way 
very heedfully. “Perhaps we walked you a little 
too far yesterday. We are so used to tramping 
that — ” Lawford kept thoughtful eyes fixed on 
the deprecating face. 


Glimpses of the Unremembered 289 

“I see what it is, Herbert — ^you are humouring 
me again. I have been wracking my brains in vain 
to remember exactly what did happen yesterday. 
I feel as if it was all sunk oceans deep in sleep. I 
get so far — and then I ’m done. It won’t give up 
a hint. But you really must n’t think I ’m an 
invalid, or — or in my second childhood. The 
truth is,” he added naively, “ it ’s my first, come 
back again. But now that I ’ve got so far, now 
that I ’m really better, I — ” He broke off rather 
vacantly, as if afraid of his own confidence. “I 
must be getting on,” he summed up with an effort, 
^ ‘ and that ’s the solemn fact. I keep on forgetting 
I ’m — I ’m a ratepayer!” 

Herbert sat round in his chair. You see. Law- 
ford, the very term is little else than double Dutch 
to me. As a matter of fact Grisel sends all my 
hush-money to the horrible people that do the 
cleaning up, as it were. I can’t catch their drift. 
Government, to me, is merely the spectacle of the 
clever, or the specious, managing the dull. It 
deals merely with the physical, and just the fringe 
of consciousness. I am not joking. I think I 
follow you. All I mean is that the obligations — 
mainly tepid, I take it — that are luring you back 
to the fold would be the very ones that would scare 
me quickest off. The imagination, the appeal 
faded: we ’re dead.” 

Lawford opened his mouth: ^^Temporarily 
tepid,” he at last all but coughed out. 


19 


290 


The Return 


‘^Oh, yes, of course,” said Herbert intelligently. 
^‘Only temporarily. It ’s this beastly gregarious- 
ness that ’s the devil. The very thought of it 
undoes me — with an absolute shock of sheepish- 
ness. I suddenly realise my human nakedness: 
that here we are, little better than naked animals, 
bleating behind our illusory wattles on the slopes 
of — of infinity. And nakedness, after all, is a 
wholesome thing to realise only when one thinks 
too much of one’s clothes. I peer sometimes, 
feebly enough, out of my wool, and it seems to me 
that all these busybodies, all these fact-devourers, 
all this news-reading rabble, are nothing brighter 
than very dull-witted children trying to play an 
imaginative game, much too deep for their poor 
reasons. Even then we have left the fanatics and 
the Mammonites out. The others, the ^ happy 
mediums,’ dare n’t wink, dare n’t so much as look 
at one another. Their principles are like some old 
savage chief’s top-hat : it clinches his tmpresen table- 
ness. I don’t mean, of course, my dear fellow, that 
your wanting to go home is anything gregarious, 
but I do think their insisting on your coming at once 
might be. Still, I know you won’t visit this stuff 
on me as anything more than just my ‘scum,’ as 
Grisel calls the fine flower of my maiden medita- 
tions. All that I really want to say, all that I hope, 
my dear chap, there ’s not by this time the least 
need for me to say, is that we should both be more 
than delighted if you ’d stay just as long as it will 


Glimpses of the Unremembered 291 

not be a bore for you to stay. Stay till you ^re 
heartily tired of us! Go back now, if you must; 
tell them how much better you are. Bolt off to 
a nerve specialist. He *11 say complete rest — 
change of scene, and all that . They all do. Instinct 
vid intellect. And why not take your rest here? 
We are such miserably dull company to one an- 
other it would be a greater pleasure to have you 
with us than I can say. Do!” 

Lawford listened. “I wish — ,** he began, and 
stopped dead again. Anyhow, I ’ll go back. 
I am afraid, Herbert, I ’ve been playing truant. 
It was all very well while — To tell you the 
truth I can’t think quite straight yet. But it 
won’t last for ever. Besides — well, anyhow, I ’ll 
go back.” 

“Right you are,” said Herbert, pretending to 
be cheerful. “You can’t expect, you really can’t, 
everything to come right straight away. Just 
have patience. And now, let ’s go out and sit 
in the sun, They ’ve mixed October up with 
May.” 

And about half an hour afterwards he glanced up 
from his book to find his visitor fast sleeep in his 
garden chair. 

Grisel had taken her brother’s place, with a little 
pile of needlework beside her on the grass, when 
Lawford again opened his eyes under the rosy 
shade of a parasol. He watched her for a while, 
without speaking. 


292 


The Return 


^‘How long have I been asleep?” he said at 
last. 

She started and looked up from her needle. 

“That depends on how long you have been 
awake, ’ ’ she said, smiling. ‘ ‘ My brother tells me, * ’ 
she went on, beginning to stitch, “that you have 
made up your mind to leave us to-day. Perhaps 
we are only flattering ourselves it has been a rest. 
But if it has — is that, do you think, quite wise?” 

He leant forward and hid his face in his hands. 
“It ’s because — it ’s because it ’s the only * must * 
I can see.” 

“But even ^ musts — ^well, we have to be sure 
even of ‘musts,’ haven’t we? Are you?” She 
glanced up and for an instant their eyes met, and 
the falling water seemed to be sotmding out of a 
distance so remote it might be but the echo of a 
dream. She stooped once more over her work. 

“Supposing,” he said very slowly, and almost as 
if speaking to himself, “supposing Sabathier — and 
you know he ’s only just like a friend now one 
must n’t be seen talking to — supposing he came 
back; what then?” 

“ Oh, but Sabathier ’s gone: he never really came. 
It was only a fancy — a mood. It was only you — 
another you.” 

“Who was that yesterday, then?” 

She glanced at him swiftly and knew the ques- 
tion was but a venture. 

“Yesterday?” 


Glimpses of the Unremembered 293 

^‘Oh, very well,” he said fretfully, '‘you too! 
But if he did, if he did really come back: ‘prey’ 
and all?” 

“What is the riddle?” she said, taking a deep 
breath and facing him brightly. 

“Would my ‘ must ’ still be his The face he 
raised to her, as he leaned forward under the 
direct light of the sun, was so lined and haggard, 
the thought crossed her mind that it did indeed 
seem little more than a shadowy mask that just 
one hour of darkness might dispel. 

“You said, you know, we did win through. 
Why then should we be even thinking of defeat 
now?” 

‘“We’l” 

“Oh, no, you!” she cried triumphantly. 

“You do not answer my question.” 

“Nor you mine! It a glorious victory. Is 
there the ghost of a reason why you should cast 
your mind back? Is there now?” 

“Only,” said Lawford, looking patiently up into 
her face, “only because I love you”: and listened 
in the silence to the words as one may watch a bird 
that has escaped out of its cage steadily flying on 
and on till lost to sight. 

For an instant the grey eyes faltered. “But 
that, surely,” she began in a low voice, still stead- 
ily sewing, “that was our compact last night — that 
you should let me help, that you should trust me 
just as you trusted the mother years ago who came 


294 


The Return 


in the little cart with the shaggy dusty pony to the 
homesick boy watching at the window. Perhaps,” 
she added almost mischievously, ^‘in this odd 
shuffle of souls and faces, I am that mother, and 
most frightfully anxious you should not give in. 
Why, even because of the tiredness, even because 
the cause seems vain, you must still fight on — 
would n’t she have said it? Surely there are 
prizes, a daughter, a career, no end! And even 
they gone — still the self undimmed, undaunted, 
that took its drubbing like a man.” 

“I know you know I ’m all but crazed; you see 
this wretched mind all littered and broken down; 
look at me like that, then! Forget even you 
have befriended me and pretended — Why must 
I blunder on and on like this! Oh, Grisel, my 
friend, my friend, if only you loved me!” 

Tears clouded her eyes. She turned vaguely 
as if for a hiding-place. ^‘We can’t talk here. 
How mad the whole day is! Listen, listen! I 
do — I do love you — mother and woman and 
friend — ^from the very moment you came. It ’s 
all so clear, so clear: that, and your miserable 
‘must,’ my friend. Come, we will go away by 
ourselves a little, and talk. That way! I ’ll 
meet you by the gate.” 


CHAPTER XXI 


THE PARTING 

She came out into the sunlight, and they went 
through the little gate together. She walked 
quickly, without speaking, over the bridge, past 
a little cottage whose hollyhocks leaned fading 
above its low flint wall. Skirting a field of stubble, 
she struck into a wood by a path that ran steeply 
up the hillside. And by and by they came to a 
glen where the woodmen of a score of years ago 
had felled the trees, leaving a green hollow of 
saplings in the midst of their towering neighbours. 

There,” she said, holding out her hand to him, 
‘‘now we are alone. Just six hours or so — and 
then the stm will be there,” she pointed to the 
tree- tops to the west, “and then you will have to 
go ; for good, for good — ^you your way and I mine. 
What a tangle — a tangle is this life of ours ! Could 
I have dreamt we should ever be talking like this, 
you and I? Friends of an hour! What will you 
think of me? Does it matter? Don’t speak! 
Say nothing — poor face, poor hands! If only 
there were something to look to — to pray to!” 
295 


296 


The Return 


She bent over his hand and pressed it to her breast. 
*‘What worlds we Ve seen together, you and L 
And then — another parting.” 

They wandered on a little way, and came back, 
and listened to the first few birds that fiew up into 
the higher branches, noonday being past, to sing. 

They talked, and were silent, and talked again; 
without question, or sadness, or regret, or reproach ; 
she mocking even at themselves, mocking at this 
change” — “Why, and yet without it, would you 
ever even have dreamed once a poor fool of a 
Frenchman went to his restless grave for me — for 
me! Need we understand! Were we told to 
pry? Who made us human must be human too. 
Why must we take such care, and make such a 
fret — this soul! I know it, I know it; it is all we 
have — ^to save,’ they say, poor creatures! No, 
never to spend, and so they dare n’t for a solitary 
instant lift it on the finger from its cage. Well, 
we have ; and now, soon, back it must go, back it 
must go, and try its best to whistle the day out. 
And yet, do you know, perhaps the very freedom 
does a little shake its — its monotony. It ’s true, 
you see, they have lived a long time ; these Worldly 
Wisefolk; they were wise before they were 
swaddled. ...” 

“There, and you are hungry?” she asked him, 
laughing in his eyes. “Of course, of course you 
are — scarcely a mouthful since that first still 
wonderful supper. And you have n’t slept a wink. 


297 


The Parting 

except like a tired-out child after its first party, 
in that old garden chair. I sat and watched, and 
yes, almost hoped you ’d never wake in case — in 
case! Come along, see, down there. I can’t go 
home just yet. There ’s a little old inn — we ’ll 
go and sit down there — as if we were really trying 
to be romantic! I know the woman quite well; 
we can talk there — just the day out.” 

They sat at a little table in the garden of “The 
Cherry Trees,” its thick green branches burdened 
with ripened fruit. And Grisel tried to persuade 
him to eat and drink, “for to-morrow we die,” 
she said, her hands trembling, her face as it were 
veiled with a faint, mysterious light. 

“There are dozens and dozens of old stories, you 
know,” she said, leaning on her elbows, “dozens 
and dozens, meaning only us. You must, you must 
eat; look, just an apple. We ’ve got to say good- 
bye. And faintness will double the difficulty.” 
She lightly touched his hand as if to compel him to 
smile with her. “There, I ’ll peel it; and this is 
Eden ; and soon it will be the cool of the evening. 
And then, oh, yes, the voice will come! What 
nonsense I am talking ! Never mind ! ” They sat 
on in the quiet sunshine, and a spider slid softly 
through the air and with busy claws set to its nets ; 
and those small ghosts, the robins, went whistling 
restlessly among the heavy boughs. 

A little child came out of the porch of the inn 
into the garden, and stood with her battered doll in 


298 


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her arms, softly watching them a while. But 
when Grisel smiled and tried to coax her over, she 
burst out laughing and ran in again. 

Lawford stooped forward on his chair with a 
groan. ^‘You see,’' he said, “the whole world 
mocks me. You say ‘this evening’; need it be, 
must it be this evening? If you only knew how 
far they have driven me ! If you only knew what 
we should only detest each other for saying and 
for listening to! The whole thing ’s dulled and 
staled. Who wants a changeling? Who wants a 
painted bird? Who does not loathe the con- 
verted? — and I — I ’m converted to Sabathier’s 
God. Should we be sitting here talking like this 
if I were not so? I can’t, I can’t go back.” 

She rose and stood with her hand pressed over 
her mouth, watching him. 

“Won’t you understand?” he continued. “I 
am an outcast — a felon caught red-handed, come 
in the flesh to a hideous and righteous judgment. 
I hear myself saying all these things; and yet, 
Grisel, I do, I do love you with all the dull best I 
ever had. Not now, then; I don’t ask now even. 
I can, I would begin again. God knows my face 
has changed enough even as it is. Think of me 
as that poor wandering ghost of yours ; how easily 
I could hide away — in your memory; and just 
wait, wait for you. In time, dear, even this wild 
futile madness too would fade away. Then I 
could come back. May I try?” 


299 


The Parting 

*‘I can’t answer you. I can’t reason. Only, 
still, I do know, talk, put off, forget as I may, 
must is must. Right and wrong, who knows 
what they mean, except that one ’s to be done and 
one ’s to be forsworn; or — forgive, my friend, 
the truest thing I ever said — or else we lose the 
savour of both. Oh, then, and I know, too, you ’d 
weary of me. I know you, M. Nicholas, better 
than you can ever know yourself, though you have 
risen from your grave. You follow a dream, no 
voice or face or flesh and blood; and not to do 
what the one old raven within you cries you must 
would be in time to hate the very sound of my 
footstep. You shall go back, poor turncoat, and 
face the clearness, the utterly more difficult, bald, 
and heartless clearness, as together we faced the 
dark. Life is a little while. And though I have 
no words to tell what always are and must be 
foolish reasons because they are not reasons at 
all but ghosts of memory, I know in my heart that 
to face the worst is your only hope of peace. And 
should I have staked so much on your finding that, 
and now throw up the game! Don’t let us talk 
any more. I ’ll walk half the way, perhaps. Per- 
haps I will walk all the way. I think my brother 
guesses — at least my madness. I ’ve talked and 
talked him nearly past his patience. And then, 
when you are quite safely, oh, yes, quite safely and 
soundly gone, then I shall go away for a little, so 
that we can’t even hear each other speak, except 


300 


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in dreams. Life! — well, I always thought it was 
much too plain a tale to have as dull an ending. 
And with us the powers beyond have played a 
newer trick, that ’s all. Another hour, and we will 
go. Till then there 's just the solitary walk home 
and only the dull old haunted house that hoards 
as many ghosts as we ourselves to watch our 
coming.” 

Evening began to shine between the trees ; they 
seemed to stand aflame, with a melancholy rapture 
in their uplifted boughs above their fading coats. 
The fields of the garnered harvest shone with a 
golden stillness, awhir with shimmering flocks of 
starlings. And the old birds that had sung in the 
spring sang now amid the same leaves, grown 
older, too, to give them harbourage. 

Herbert was sitting in his room when they re- 
turned, nursing his teacup on his knee while he 
pretended to be reading, with elbow propped on 
the table. 

^‘Here 's Nicholas Sabathier, my dear, come to 
say good-bye a while,” said Grisel. She stood for a 
moment in her white gown, her face turned towards 
the clear green twilight of the open window. ‘T 
have promised to walk part of the way with him. 
But I think first we must have some tea. No; he 
flatly refuses to be driven. We are going to walk. ’ ' 

The two friends were left alone, face to face with 
a rather difficult silence, only the least degree of 
nervousness apparent, so far as Herbert was con- 


301 


The Parting 

cemed, in that odd, aloof, sustained air of imper- 
sonality that had so baffled his companion in their 
first queer talk together. 

^^Your sister said just now, Herbert,*’ blurted 
Lawford at last, '“Here’s Nicholas Sabathier 
come to say good-bye’ ; well, I — what I want you 
to understand is that it is Sabathier, the worst he 
ever was; but also that it is 'good-bye.’ ” 

Herbert slowly turned. "I don’t quite see 
why 'good-bye,’ Lawford. And — frankly, there is 
nothing to explain. We have chosen to live such a 
very out-of-the-way life,” he went on, as if follow- 
ing up a train of thought. "The truth is, if 
one wants to live at all — one’s own life, I mean — 
there ’s no time for many friends. And just 
steadfastly regarding your neighbour’s tail as you 
follow it down into the Nowhere — it ’s that that 
seems to me the deadliest form of hypnotism. 
One must simply go on one’s own way, doing one’s 
best to free one’s mind of cant — and I dare say 
clearing some excellent stuff out with the rubbish. 
One runs that risk. And the consequence is that 
I don’t think, however foolhardy it may be to say 
so, I don’t think I care a groat for any opinion as 
human as my own, good or bad. My sister ’s a 
million times a better woman than I am a man. 
What possibly could there be, then, for me to say ? ” 
He turned with a nervous smile that yet seemed 
to be the very flower of candour. "Why should 
it be good-bye?” 


302 


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Lawford glanced involuntarily towards the door 
that stood in shadow duskily ajar. ^‘Well/* he 
said, ^‘we have talked, and we think it must be 
that, until, at least,” he smiled faintly, “I can come 
as quietly as your old ghost you told me of; and 
in that case it may not be so very long to wait.” 
Their eyes met fleetingly across the still, listening 
room. The more I think of it, ” Lawford pushed 
slowly on, “the less I understand the frantic pur- 
poselessness of all that has happened to me. Until 
I went down, as you said, ‘a godsend of a little 
Miss Muffet,' and the inconceivable farce came off, 
I was fairly happy, fairly contented to dance my 
little wooden dance and to wait till the showman 
should put me down into his box again. And 
now — well, here I am. The whole thing has gone 
by and scarcely left a trace of its visit. Here I am 
for all my friends to swear to; and yet, Herbert, 
if you 'll forgive me troubling you with all this 
stuff about myself, not a single belief, or thought, 
or desire remains unchanged. You will think 
of all that, I hope. It 's not, of course, the ghost 
of an apology, only the mere facts.” 

Herbert rose and paced slowly across to the 
window. “The longer I live, Lawford, the more I 
curse this futile gift of speech. Here am I, want- 
ing to tell you, to say out frankly what, if mind 
could appeal direct to mind, would be merely as 
the wind passing through the leaves of a tree with 
just one — one multitudinous rustle, but which. 


303 


The Parting 

if I tried now to put into words — well, daybreak 
would find us still groping on. Personally, I have 
grown tired of facing enigmas no mortal man has 
ever answered to his own or to any one else’s 
satisfaction. His merciful contemporaries did not 
scrawl it on poor old Sabathier’s tombstone, but 
there is no peace for the wicked, and we 're all, I 
suppose, pretty much that, if what wicked means 
is to be sick to death of one's limitations and sick 
to death of trying to scramble over them. I 've 
worn boots out at the game, I can tell you. Who 
has n't? Say no more, my dear fellow. Explana- 
tion was n't a bit needed. We 're just where we 
were; that 's all." 

*‘Well," said Lawford, as if with an almost 
hopeless effort to turn thought into such primi- 
tive speech, “ that 's where we stand, then." He got 
up suddenly like a man awakened in the midst 
of unforeseen danger — “Where is your sister?" he 
cried, looking into the darkness. And as if in 
actual answer to his entreaty, they heard the 
clinking of the cups on the little, old, green lacquer 
tray she was at that moment carrying into the 
room. She sat down on the window-seat and put 
the tray down beside her. “It will be before dark 
even now," she said, glancing out at the faintly 
burning skies. 

They had trudged on together with almost as 
deep a sense of physical exhaustion as peasants 


304 


The Return 


have who have been labouring in the fields since 
daybreak. And a little beyond the village, before 
the last, long road began that led in presently to 
the housed and scrupulous suburb, she stopped 
with a sob beside an old scarred milestone by the 
wayside. “This, my dear friend, is as far as I can 
go,” she said. She stooped, and laid her hand on 
the cold, moss-grown surface of the stone. “Even 
now it ’s wet with dew.” She rose again and 
looked strangely into his face. “Yes, yes, here 
it is,” she said, “oh, and worse, worse than any fear. 
But nothing now can trouble you again of that. 
We ’re both at least past that.” 

“Grisel,” he said, “forgive me, but I can’t — I 
can’t go on.” 

“Don’t think, don’t think,” she said, taking his 
hands, and lifting them to her bosom. “It ’s only 
how the day goes; and it has all, my dear, happened 
scores and scores of times before — mother and 
child and friend — and lovers that are all these too, 
like us. We must n’t cry out. Perhaps it was all 
before even we could speak — this sorrow came. 
Take all the hope and all the future: and then may 
come our chance.” 

“What ’s life to me now! You said the desire 
would come back ; that I should shake myself free. 
I could if you would help me. I don’t know what 
you are or what your meaning is, only that I love 
you ; care for nothing, wish for nothing but to see 
you and think of you. A flat, dull voice keeps 


305 


The Parting 

saying that I have no right to be telling you all 
this. You will know best. I know I am nothing. 
I ask nothing. If we love one another, what is 
there else to say?” 

“ Nothing, nothing to say, except only good-bye. 
What could you tell me that I have not told myself 
over and over again? Reason 's gone. Think- 
ing 's gone. Now I am only sure.” She smiled 
shadowily . ^ ‘ What peace did he find who could n’t, 
perhaps, like you, face the last good-bye?” 

They stood in utter solitude a while in the 
evening gloom. The air was as still and cold as 
some grey, unfathomable, untraversed sea. Above 
them uncountable clouds drifted slowly across 
space. 

*‘Why do they all keep whispering together?” 
he said in a low voice, with cowering face. ^‘Oh, 
if you knew, Grisel, how they have hemmed me 
in; how they have come pressing in through 
the narrow gate I left ajar — only to mock and 
mislead. It ’s all dark and unintelligible.” He 
touched her hand, peering out of the shadows 
that seemed to him to be gathering between their 
faces. He drew her closer and touched her lips 
with his fingers. Her beauty seemed to his dis- 
torted senses to fill earth and sky. This, then, was 
the presence, the grave and lovely overshadow- 
ing dream whose surrender made life a torment, 
and death the nearer fold of an immortal, starry 
veil. She broke from him with a faint cry. 


20 


3o6 


The Return 


And he found himself running and running, 
just as he had nm that other night, with death 
instead of life for inspiration, towards , his earthly- 
home. 


CHAPTER XXII 


lawford's case is discussed 

He was utterly wearied, but he walked on for 
a long while with a dogged, unglancing pertina- 
city without looking behind him. And then he 
rested under the dew-sodden hedgeside and buried 
his face in his hands. Once, indeed, he did turn 
and walk back with hard, uplifted face for many 
minutes, but at the meeting with an old woman 
who, in the late dusk, passed him unheeded on the 
road, he stopped again, and after standing a while 
looking down in the dust, trying to gather up the 
tangled threads of his thoughts, he once more set 
off homewards. 

It was clear, starry, and quite dark when he 
reached the house. The lamp at the roadside 
obscurely lit its breadth and height. Lamp-light 
within, too, was showing yellow between the 
Venetian blinds; a cold gas-jet gleamed out of the 
basement window. He seemed bereft now of all 
desire or emotion, simply the passive witness of 
things external in a calm which, though he scarcely 
realised its cause, was an exquisite solace and 
307 


3o8 


The Return 


relief. His senses were intensely sharpened with 
sleeplessness. The faintest sound struck clear 
and keen on his ear. The thinnest beam of light 
besprinkled his eyes with curious brilliance. 

As quietly as some nocturnal creature he as- 
cended the steps to the porch, and leaning between 
stone pilaster and wall, listened intently for any 
rtunour of those within. He heard a clear, rather 
languid, and delicate voice quietly speak on until 
it broke into a little peal of laughter, followed, 
when it fell silent, by Sheila’s, rapid, rich, and low. 
The first speaker seemed to be standing. Pro- 
bably, then, his evening visitors had only just come 
in, or were preparing to depart. He inserted his 
latchkey and gently pushed at the cumbersome 
door. It was locked against him. With not the 
faintest thought of resentment or surprise, he 
turned back, stooped over the balustrade and 
looked down into the kitchen. Nothing there was 
visible but a narrow strip of the white table, on 
which lay a black cotton glove, and beyond, the 
glint of a copper pan. What made all these mute, 
inanimate things suddenly so coldly hostile? 

An extreme, almost nauseous distate filled him 
at the thought of knocking for admission, of con- 
fronting Ada, possibly even Sheila, in the cold, 
echoing gloom of the detestable porch ; of meeting 
the first wild, almost metallic, flash of recognition. 
He stepped softly down again, and paused at 
the open gate. Once before the voices of the 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 309 


night had called him: they would not summon 
him for ever in vain. He raised his eyes again 
towards the window. Who were these visitors 
met together to drum the alien out? He narrowed 
his lids and smiled up at the vacuous, unfriendly 
house. Then wheeling, on a sudden impulse he 
groped his way down the gravel path that led into 
the garden. As he had left it, the long, white 
window was ajar. 

With extreme caution he pushed it noiselessly 
up, climbed in, and stood listening again in the 
black passage on the other side. When he had 
fully recovered his breath, and the knocking of his 
heart was stilled, he trod on softly, till turning the 
corner he came in sight of the kitchen door. It 
was now narrowly open, just enough, perhaps, to 
admit a cat; and as he softly approached, looking 
steadily in, he could see Ada sitting at the empty 
table, beneath the single whistling chandelier, in 
her black dress and black straw hat. She was 
reading, apparently ; but her back was turned to 
him, and he could not distinguish her arm beyond 
the elbow. But almost in an instant he discovered 
as, drawn up and unstirring, he gazed on, that she 
was not reading, but had covertly, instantaneously 
raised her eyes from the print on the table beneath, 
and was transfixedly listening too. He turned his 
eyes away and waited. When again he peered 
in she had apparently bent once more over her 
magazine, and he stole on. 


310 


The Return 


One by one, with a thin, remote exultation in his 
progress, he mounted the kitchen stairs, and with 
each deliberate and groping step the voices above 
him became more clearly audible. And at last, 
in the darkness of the hall, but faintly stirred 
by the gleam of lamplight from the chink of the 
dining-room door, he stood on the threshold of 
the drawing-room, and could hear with varying 
distinctness what these friendly voices were so 
absorbedly discussing. His ear seemed as ex- 
quisite as some contrivance of science, registering 
passively the least sound, the faintest syllable, and 
like it, in no sense meddling with the thought that 
speech conveyed. He simply stood hearkening, 
fixed and motionless, like some uncouth statue in 
the leafy hollow of a garden stonily unspeculating. 

‘‘Oh, but you either refuse to believe, Bettie, 
or you won’t understand that it ’s far worse than 
that.” Sheila seemed to be upbraiding, or at least 
reasoning with, the last speaker. “Ask Mr. Dan- 
ton — ^he actually saw him.” 

“‘Saw him,’” repeated the thick, still 'voice. 
“He stood there, in that very doorway, Mrs. Lovat, 
and positively railed at me. He stood there and 
streamed out all the names he could lay his tongue 
to. I was n’t unfriendly to the poor beggar. 
When Bethany let me into it I thought it was 
simply — I did, indeed, Mrs. Lawford — a monstrous 
exaggeration. Flatly, I didn’t believe it; shall 
I say that? But when I stood face to face with 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 31 1 


him, I could have taken my oath that that was 
no more poor old Arthur Lawford than — well, I 
won’t repeat what particular word occurred to 
me. But there!” the corpulent shrug was almost 
audible, “we all know what old Bethany is. A 
sterling old chap, mind you, so far as mere char- 
acter is concerned ; the right man in the right place ; 
but as gullible and as soft-hearted as a tom- tit. 
I Ve said all this before, I know, Mrs. Lawford, 
and been properly snubbed for my pains. But if 
I had been Bethany I ’d have sifted the whole 
story at the beginning, the moment he put his foot 
into the house. Look at that Tichbome fellow — 
went for months and months, just picking up one 
day what he floored old Hawkins — was n’t it? — 
with the next. But of course,” he added gloomily, 
“now that ’s all too late. He ’s wormed himself 
into a tolerably tight comer. I ’d just like to see, 
though, a British jury comparing the claimant 
with his photograph, ’pon my word I would. 
Where would he be then, do you think?” 

“But, my dear Mr. Danton,” went on the clear, 
languid voice Lawford had heard break so light- 
heartedly into laughter, “you don’t mean to tell me 
that a woman doesn’t know her own husband 
when she sees him — or, for the matter of that, 
when she doesn’t see him? If Tom came home 
from a ramble as handsome as Apollo to-morrow, 
I ’d recognise him at the very first blush — ^literally 1 
He ’d go nuzzling off to get his slippers, or com- 


312 


The Return 


plain that the lamps had been smoking, or hunt 
the house down for last week’s paper. Oh, 
besides, Tom ’s Tom — and there ’s an end of it.” 

^‘That ’s precisely what I think, Mrs. Lovat; 
one is saturated with one’s personality, as it were.” 

^^You see, that ’s just it! That ’s just exactly 
every woman’s husband all over; he ’s saturated 
with his personality. Bravo, Mr. Craik!” 

^‘Good Lord!” said Danton softly. don’t 
deny it!” 

^‘But that,” broke in Sheila crisply — ^Hhat ’s 
just precisely what I asked you all to come in 
for. It ’s because I know now, apart altogether 
from the mere evidence, that — that he is Arthur. 
Mind, I don’t say I ever really doubted. I was 
only so utterly shocked, I suppose. I positively 
put posers to him; but his memory was perfect in 
spite of the shock which would have killed a — a 
more sensitive nature.” She had risen, it seemed, 
and was moving with all her splendid impressive- 
ness of silk and presence across the general line 
of vision. But the hall was dark and still; her 
eyes were dimmed with light. Lawford could 
dimly survey her there immoved. ^‘Are you 
there, Ada?” she called discreetly. 

“Yes, m’m,” answered the faint voice from 
below. 

“You have not heard anything — no knock?” 

“No, m’m, no knock.” 

“The door is open if you should call.” 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 313 


‘‘Yes, m’m/' 

“The girl 's scared out of her wits,’' said Sheila, 
returning to her audience. “I’ve told you all 
that miserable Ferguson story — a piece of calm, 
callous presence of mind I should never have 
dreamed my husband capable of. And the ciuious 
thing is — at least, it is no longer curious in the 
light of the ghastly facts I am only waiting for 
Mr. Bethany to tell you — ^from the very first she 
instinctively detested the very mention of his 
name.” 

“I believe, you know,” said Mr. Craik with 
some decision, “that servants must have the same 
wonderful instinct as dogs and children; they are 
natural, intuitive judges of character.” 

“Yes,” said Sheila gravely, “and it’s only 
through that that I got to hear of the — the 
mysterious friend in the little pony-carriage. 
Ada’s magnificently loyal — I will say that.” 

“I don’t want to suggest anything, Mrs. Law- 
ford,” began Mr. Craik rather hurriedly, “but 
would n’t it perhaps be wiser not to wait for Mr. 
Bethany? It is not at all unusual for him to be 
kept a considerable time in the vestry after service, 
and to-day is the Feast of St. Michael’s and all 
Angels, you know. Mightn’t your husband be 
returning, don’t you think?” 

“ Craik ’s right, Mrs. Lawford; it’s not a bit 
of good waiting. Bethany would stick there till 
midnight if any old woman’s spiritual state could 


314 


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keep her going so long. Here we all are, and at 
any moment we may be interrupted. Mind you, 
I promise nothing— only that there shall be no 
scene. But here I am, and if he does come knock- 
ing and ringing and lunging out in the disgusting 
manner — ^well, all I ask is permission to speak for 
you. Ton my word, to think what you must 
have gone through ! It is n’t the place for ladies 
just now — ^honestly it is n’t. 

“Besides, supposing the romantic lady of the 
pony-carriage has friends? Are you a pugilist, 
Mr. Craik?” 

“I hope I could give some little account of my- 
self, Mrs. Lovat; but you need have no anxiety 
about that.” 

“There, Mr. Danton! So as there is not the 
least cause for anxiety even if poor Arthur should 
return to his earthly home, may we share your 
dreadful story at once, Sheila; and then, perhaps, 
hear Mr. Bethany’s exposition of it when he does 
arrive? We are amply guarded.” 

“Honestly, you know, you are a bit of a sceptic, 
Mrs. Lovat,” pleaded Danton playfully. 
seen him.” 

“And seeing is disbelieving, I suppose. Now 
then, Sheila.” 

“ I don’t think there ’s the least chance of Arthur 
returning to-night,” said Sheila solemnly. “I am 
perfectly well aware it ’s best to be as cheerful as 
one can — and as resolved; but I think, Bettie, 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 315 

when even you know the whole horrible secret, 
you won’t think Mr. Danton was — was horrified 
for nothing. The ghastly, the awful truth is that 
my husband — there is no other word for it — ^is 
possessed!” 

“Possessed, Sheila! What in the name of all 
the creeps is that?” 

“Well, I dare say Mr. Craik will explain it 
much better than I can. By a devil, dear.” The 
voice was perfectly poised and restrained, and 
Mr. Craik did not see fit for the moment to 
embellish the definition. 

Lawford, with an almost wooden immobility, 
listened on. 

“But the devil, or a devil? Isn’t there some 
distinction?” inquired Mrs. Lovat. 

“It ’s in the Bible, Bettie, over and over again. 
It was quite a common thing in the Middle Ages ; 
I think I ’m right in saying that, am I not, Mr. 
Craik?” Mr. Craik must have solemnly nodded 
or abundantly looked his unwilling affirmation. 
“And what has been,” continued Sheila temper- 
ately, “I suppose may be again.” 

“When the fellow began raving at me the other 
night,” began Danton huskily, as if out of an un- 
fathomable pit of reflection, “among other things 
he said that I have n’t any wish to remember was 
that I was a sceptic. And Bethany said ditto to 
it. I don’t mind being called a sceptic: why, I 
myself said just now Mrs. Lovat was a sceptic! 


3i6 


The Return 


But when it comes to ‘devils/ Mrs. Lawford — I 
may be convinced about the other, but ‘devils’! 
Well, I ’ve been in the City nearly twenty-five 
years, and it ’s my impression human nature can 
raise all the devils we shall ever need. And 
another thing,” he added, as if inspired, and 
with an immensely intelligent blink, “is it just 
precisely that word in the Revised Version — eh, 
Craik?” 

“I ’ll certainly look it up, Danton. But I take 
it that Mrs. Lawford is not so much insisting on 
the word, as on the — the manifestation. And I ’m 
bound to confess that the Psychical Research 
Society, which has among its members quite 
eminent and entirely trustworthy men of science — 
I am bound to admit they have some very curious 
stories to tell. The old idea was, you know, that 
there are seventy- two princely devils, and as many 
as seven million — er — commoners. It may very 
well sound quaint to our ears, Mrs. Lovat; but 
there it is. But whether that has any bearing on 
— on what you were saying, Danton, I can’t 
say. Perhaps Mrs. Lawford will throw a little 
more light on the subject when she tells us on 
what precise facts her — ^her distressing theory is 
based.” 

Lawford had soundlessly stolen a pace or two 
nearer, and by stooping forward a little he could, 
each in turn, scrutinise the little intent company 
sitting over his story around the lamp at the 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 317 

farther end of the table; squatting like little child- 
ren with their twigs and pins, fishing for wonders 
on the brink of the unknown. 

'‘Yes,” Mrs. Lovat was saying, "I quite agree, 
Mr. Craik. Seventy-two princes, and no prin- 
cesses! But do throw a little more modern light 
on the subject, Sheila.” 

"I mean this,” said Sheila firmly. "When I 
went in for the last time to say good-bye — and of 
course it was at his own wish that I did leave 
him; and precisely why he wished it is now only 
too apparent — I had brought him some money 
from the bank — fifty pounds, I think; yes, fifty 
pounds. And quite by the merest chance I glanced 
down, in passing, at a book he had apparently 
been reading, which he seemed very anxious to 
conceal with his hand. Arthur is not a great 
reader, though I believe he studied a little before 
we were married, and — well, I detest anything like 
subterfuge, and I said it out without thinking, 

' Why, you he reading French, Arthur 1 * He turned 
deathly white but made no answer.” 

"And can’t you even confide to us the title, 
Sheila?” said Mrs. Lovat reproachfully. 

"Wait a minute,” said Sheila; "you shall make 
as much fun of the thing as you like, Bettie, when 
I ’ve finished. I don’t know why, but that peculiar, 
stealthy look haunted me. 'Why French?’ I 
kept asking myself. Arthur has n’t opened a 
French book for years. He does n’t even approve 


318 


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of the entente. His argument was that we ought 
to be friends with the Germans because they are 
more hostile. Never mind. When Ada came 
back the next evening and said he was out, I came 
the following morning by myself and knocked. 
No one answered, and I let myself in. His bed 
had not been slept in. There were candles and 
matches all over the house — one even burnt 
nearly to the stick on the floor in the corner of 
the drawing-room. I suppose it was foolish, but 
I was alone, and just that, somehow, horrifled 
me. It seemed to point to such a peculiar state 
of mind. I hesitated ; what was the use of look- 
ing further? Yet something seemed to say to 
me — and it was surely providential — ^ Go down- 
stairs ! ’ And there in the breakfast-room the first 
thing I saw on the table was this book — a dingy, 
ragged, bleared, patched-up, oh, a horrible, a 
loathsome little book (and I have read bits, too, 
here and there); and beside it was my own 
little school dictionary, my own child’s — ” She 
looked up sharply. ^'What was that? Did 
anybody call?” 

“Nobody I heard,” said Danton, staring stonily 
round. 

“It may have been the passing of the wind,” 
suggested Mr. Craik, after a pause. 

“Peep between the blinds, Mr. Craik; it may 
be poor Mr. Bethany confronting Pneumonia in 
the porch.” 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 319 


‘ ^ There no one there,” said the curate, re- 
turning softly from his errand. “Please continue 
your — your narrative, Mrs. Lawford.” 

“They are panting for the ‘devil,’ my dear.” 

“Well, I sat down and, very much against my 
inclination, turned over the pages. It was full of 
the most revolting confessions and trials, so far as I 
could see. In fact, I think the book was merely an 
amateur collection of — of horrors. And the faces, 
the portraits! Well, then, can you imagine my 
feelings when towards the end of the book, about 
thirty pages from the end, I came upon this — 
gloating up at me from the table in my own house 
before my very eyes ! ’ ’ 

She cast one rapid glance over her shoulder, and 
gathering up her silk skirt, drew out from the 
pocket beneath the few poor crumpled pages, and 
passed them without a word to Danton. Lawford 
kept him plainly in view, as, lowering his great 
face, he slowly stooped, and holding the loose 
leaves with both fat hands between his knees, 
stared into the portrait. Then he truculently 
lifted his cropped head. 

“What did I say?” he said. “What did I say? 
What did I tell old Bethany in this very room? 
What d ’ye think of that, Mrs. Lovat, for a portrait 
of Arthur Lawford? What d ’ye make of that, 
Craik — eh?” 

Mrs. Lovat glanced with arched eyebrows, and 
with her finger-tips handed the sheets on to her 


320 


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neighbour, who gazed with a settled and mournful 
frown and returned them to Sheila. 

She took the pages, folded them, and replaced 
them carefully in her pocket. She swept her hands 
over her skirts, and turned to Danton. 

“You agree,” she inquired softly, “it’s like?” 

“Like! It’s the livin’ image. The livin’ 
image,” he repeated, stretching out his arm, “as 
he stood there that very night.” 

“What will you say, then,” said Sheila, quietly, 
“what will you say if I tell you that that man, 
Nicholas de Sabathier, has been in his grave for 
over a hundred years?” 

Danton’ s little eyes seemed, if anything, to 
draw back even further into his head. “I ’d say, 
Mrs. Lawford, if you ’ll excuse the word, that it 

might be a d horrible coincidence — I ’d go 

further, an almost incredible coincidence. But 
if you want the sober truth, I ’d say it was nothing 
more than a crafty, clever, abominable piece of 
trickery. That ’s what I ’d say. Oh, you don’t 
know, Mrs. Lovat. When a scamp ’s a scamp, he ’ll 
stop at nothing. I could tell you some tales.” 

“Ah, but that ’s not all,” said Sheila, eyeing 
them steadfastly one by one. “We all of us 
know that my husband’s story was that he had gone 
down to Widderstone — into the churchyard, for 
his convalescent ramble ; that story ’s true. We all 
know that he said he had had a fit, a heart attack, 
and that a kind of — of stupor had come over him. 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 321 

I believe on my honour that ’s true too. But no 
one knows, but he himself and Mr. Bethany and 
I, that it was an old broken grave, quite at the 
bottom of the hill, that he chose for his resting- 
place, and — I can’t get the scene out of my head — 
that the name on that one solitary tombstone 
down there was — was . . . this!” 

Danton rolled his eyes. don’t begin to 
follow,” he said stubbornly. 

“You don’t mean,” said Mr. Craik, who had not 
removed his gaze from Sheila’s face, “I am not to 
take it that you mean, Mrs. Lawford, the — the 
other?” 

“Yes,” said Sheila, “his” — she patted her 
skirts — “ Sabathier’s.” 

“You mean,” said Mrs. Lovat crisply, “that 
the man in the grave is the man in the book, 
and the man in the book is — is poor Arthur’s 
changed face?” 

Sheila nodded. 

Danton rose cumbrously from his chair, looking 
beadily down on his three friends. 

“Oh, but you know, it isn’t — it isn’t right,” 
he began. “Lord! I can see him now. Glassy 
— yes, that ’s the very word I said — glassy ! It 
won’t do, Mrs. Lawford; on my solemn honour, 
it won’t do. I don’t deny it, call it what you like; 
yes, devils, if you like. But what I say as a 
practical man is that it ’s just rank — that ’s what 
it is ! Bethany ’s had too much rope. The 


322 


The Return 


time ’s gone by for sentiment and all that foolery. 
Mercy 's all very well, but after all it ’s justice 
that clinches the bargain. There ’s only one way : 
we must catch him ; we must lay the poor wretch 
by the heels before it 's too late. No publicity, 
God bless me, no ! We M have all the rags in Lon- 
don on us! They ’d pillory us nine days on end. 
We ’d never live it down. No, we must just 
hush it up — a home or something; an asylum. 
For my part,” he turned like a huge toad, his chin 
low in his collar — and I ’d say the same if it was 
my own brother, and, after all, he is your husband 
Mrs. Lawford — I ’d sooner he was in his grave. 
It takes two to play at that game, that ’s what I 
say. To lay himself open! I can't stand it — 
honestly, I can't stand it. And yet,'' he jerked 
his chin over the peak of his collar towards the 
ladies, ^‘and yet you say he's being fetched! 
comes creeping home, and is fetched at dark by a 
lady in a pony-carriage. God bless me! It 's 
rank. What,'' he broke out violently again, 
‘‘what was he doing there in a cemetery after dark? 
Do you think that beastly Frenchman would have 
played such a trick on Craik here? Would he 
have tried his little game on me? Deviltry be it, 
if you prefer the word, and all deference to you, 
Mrs. Lawford. But I know this, a couple of 
hundred years ago they would have burnt a man 
at the stake for less than a tenth of this. Ask 
Craik here! I don't know how, and I don’t know 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 323 


when: his mother, I Ve always heard say, was 
a little eccentric ; but the truth is he ’s managed by 
some tmholy legerdemain to get the thing at his 
fingers’ ends; that ’s what it is! Think of that im- 
speakable book! Left open on the table! Look 
at his Ferguson game! It ’s our solemn duty to 
keep him for good and all out of mischief. It 
reflects all round. There ’s no getting out of it;^ 
we ’re all in it. And tar sticks. And then there ’s 
poor little Alice to consider, and — and yourself, 
Mrs. Lawford ; I would n’t give the fellow — ^friend 
though he was, in a way — ^it is n’t safe to give him 
five minutes’ freedom. We ’ve simply got to save 
you from yourself, Mrs. Lawford; that ’s what 
it is — and from old-fashioned sentiment. And I 
only wish Bethany was here now to dispute it!” 

He stirred himself down, as it were, into his 
clothes, and stood in the middle of the hearthrug, 
gently oscillating, with his hands behind his back. 
But at some faint rumour out of the silent house 
his posture suddenly stiffened, and he lifted a 
little, with heavy, steady lids, his head. 

*‘What is the matter, Danton?” said Mr. 
Craik uneasily; “why are you listening?” 

“I wasn’t listening,” said Danton stoutly, “I 
was thinking.” 

At the same moment, at the creak of a footstep 
on the kitchen stairs, Lawford also had drawn 
soundlessly back into the darkness of the empty 
drawing-room. 


324 


The Return 


‘‘While Mr. Danton ‘is thinking/ Sheila/’ Mrs. 
Lovat was softly interposing, “do please listen a 
moment to me! Do you mean really that that 
Frenchman — the one you Ve pocketed — is the 
poor creature in the grave?” 

“Yes, Mrs. Lawford,” said Mr. Craik, putting 
out his face a little, “are we to take it that you 
mean that?” 

“It 's the same date, dear, the same name even 
to the spelling; what else can I possibly think?” 

“And that the poor creature in the grave actually 
climbed up out of the darkness and — ^well, what?” 

“I know no more than you now, Bettie. But 
the two faces — ^you must remember you haven’t 
seen my husband since'' 

“And Mr. Bethany?” said Mr. Craik, feeling 
his way. 

“Pah! Bethany, Craik! He’d back Old Nick 
himself if he came with a good tale. We ’ve got 
to act ; we ’ve got to settle his hash before he does 
any mischief.” 

“Well,” began Mrs. Lovat, smiling a little re- 
morsefully beneath the arch of her raised eyebrows, 
“I sincerely hope you ’ll all forgive me ; but I really 
am, heart and soul, with Old Nick, as Mr. Danton 
seems on intimate terms enough to call him. 
Dead, he is really immensely alluring ; and alive, I 
think, awfully pitiful and — and pathetic. But if I 
know anything of Arthur he won’t be beaten by a 
Frenchman. As for just the face, I think, do you 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 325 

know, I almost prefer dark men” — she glanced up 
at the face immediately in front of the clock — 
^‘at least,” she added softly, “when they are not 
looking very vindictive. I suppose people often 
are possessed, Mr. Craik? How many 'deadly 
sins’ are there?” 

“As a matter of fact, Mrs. Lovat, there are 
seven. But I think in this case Mrs. Lawford 
intends to suggest not so much that — that her 
husband is in that condition; habitual sin, you 
know — ^grave enough, of course, I own — but that 
he is actually being compelled, even to the extent 
of a more or less complete change of physiognomy, 
to follow the biddings of some atrocious spiritual 
influence. It is no breach of confidence to say that 
I have myself been present at a death-bed where 
the struggle against what I may call the end was 
perfectly awful to witness. I don’t profess to fol- 
low all the ramifications of the affair, but though 
possibly Mr. Danton may seem a little harsh, 
such harshness, if I may venture to intercede, is 
not necessarily ‘vindictive.’ And — and personal 
security is a consideration.” 

“If you only knew the awful fear, the awful 
uncertainty I have been in, Bettie! Oh, it is 
worse, infinitely worse, than you can possibly 
imagine. I have myself heard the voice speak out 
of him — a high, hard, nasal voice. I ’ve seen 
what Mr. Danton calls the ‘glassiness’ come into 
his face, and an expression so wild and so appall- 


326 


The Return 


ingly depraved, as it were, that I have had to 
hurry down-stairs to hide myself from the thought. 
I ’m willing to sacrifice everything for my own 
husband and for Alice ; but can it be expected of 
me to go on harbouring — ” Lawford listened on 
in vain for a moment ; poor Sheila, it seemed, had 
all but broken down. 

“Look here, Mrs. Lawford,” began Danton 
huskily, “you really mustn’t give way; you 
really must n’t. It ’s awful, unspeakably awful, I 
admit. But here we are, friends, in the midst 
of friends. And there ’s absolutely nothing — 
What ’s that? Eh? Who is it? Oh, the maid.” 

Ada stood in the doorway looking in. “All I ’ve 
come to ask, ma’am,” she said in a low voice, “is, 
Am I to stay downstairs any longer? And are 
you aware there ’s somebody in the house?” 

“What ’s that? What ’s that your ’re saying? ” 
broke out the husky voice again. “Control your- 
self ! Speak gently ! What ’s that ? ’ ’ 

“Begging your pardon, sir, I ’m perfectly under 
control. And all I say is that I can’t stay any 
longer alone downstairs there. There ’s some- 
body in the house.” 

A concentrated hush seemed to have fallen on 
the little assembly. 

“ ‘Somebody’ — but who?” said Sheila out of the 
silence. “You come up here, Ada, with these idle 
fancies. Who ’s in the house? There has been 
no knock — no footstep.” 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 327 

^‘No knock, no footstep, m’m, that I Ve heard. 
It 's Dr. Ferguson, m’m. He was here that first 
night ; and he ’s been here ever since. He was here 
when I came on Tuesday; and he was here last 
night. And he ’s here now. I can’t be deceived 
by my own feelings. It ’s not right, it ’s not out- 
spoken to keep me in the dark like this. And if 
you have no objection, m’m, I would like to go 
home.” 

Lawford in his utter weariness had nearly closed 
the door and now sat bent up on a chair, wonder- 
ing vaguely when this poor play was coming to 
an end, longing with an intensity almost beyond 
endurance for the keen night air, the open sky. 
But still his ears drank in every tiniest sound or stir. 
He heard Danton’s lowered voice muttering his 
arguments. He heard Ada quietly sniffing in the 
darkness of the hall. And this was his world! 
This was his life’s panorama, creaking on at every 
step. This was the “must” Grisel had sent him 
back to — these poor fools packed together in a 
panic at an old stale tale! Well, they would all 
come out presently, and cluster; and the crested, 
cackling fellow would lead them safely away out of 
the haunted farmyard. 

He started out of his reverie at Danton’s voice 
close at hand. 

“Look here, my good girl, we have n’t the least 
intention of keeping you in the dark. If you 
want to leave your mistress like this in the midst 


328 


The Return 


of her anxieties she says you can go and welcome. 
But it ’s not a bit of good in the world coming up 
with these cock-and-bull stories. The truth is 
your master ’s mad, that ’s the sober truth of it — 
hopelessly insane, you understand; and we ’ve 
got to find him. But nothing ’s to be said, d’ ye 
see? It ’s got to be done without fuss or scandal. 
But if there ’s any witness wanted, or anything 
of that kind, why, here you are; and,'' he dropped 
his voice to an almost inaudible hoot, “and well 
worth your while! You did see him, eh? Step 
into the trap, and all that?" 

Ada stood silent a moment. “I don't know, 
sir," she began quietly, “by what right you speak 
to me about what you call my cock-and-bull 
stories. If the master is mad, all I can say to 
anybody is I 'm very sorry to hear it. I came 
to my mistress, sir, if you please; and I prefer to 
take my orders from who has a right to give them. 
Did I understand you to say, m'm, that you 
would n't want me any more this evening?" 

Sheila had swept solemnly to the door. “Mr. 
Danton meant all that he said quite kindly, Ada. 
I can perfectly understand your feelings — ^perfectly. 
And I 'm very much obliged to you for all your 
kindness to me in very trying circumstances. We 
are all agreed — we are forced to the terrible con- 
clusion which — ^which Mr. Danton has just — ex- 
pressed. And I know I can rely on your discretion. 
Don't stay on a moment if you really are afraid. 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 329 


But when you say ‘ some one ’ Ada, do you mean — 
some one like you or me; or do you mean — the 
other?” 

Ve been sitting in the kitchen, m’m, unable 
to move. I ’m watched everywhere. The other 
evening I went into the drawing-room — I was alone 
in the house — and ... I can’t describe it. It 
was n’t dark ; and yet it was all still and black, 
like the ruins after a fire. I don’t mean I saw it, 
only that it was like a scene. And then the 
watching — I am quite aware to some it may sound 
all fancy. But I ’m not superstitious, never was. 
I only mean, m’m, that I can’t sit long alone. 
Else, I ’m quite myself. So if so be you don’t want 
me any more, if I can’t be of any further use to 
you or to — to master, I ’d prefer to go home.” 

^‘Very well, Ada; thank you. You can go out 
this way.” The door was unchained and un- 
bolted, and “Good night” said. And Sheila 
swept back in sombre pomp to her absorbed 
friends. 

“She ’s quite a good creature at heart,” she ex- 
plained frankly, as if to disclaim any finesse, “and 
almost quixotically loyal. But what really did 
she mean, do you think? She is so obstinate. 
That maddening ‘some one’ ! How they do repeat 
themselves! It can’t be my husband; not Dr. 
Ferguson, I mean. You don’t suppose — oh, surely, 
not some one else ! ” Again the dark silence of the 
house seemed to drift in on the little company. 


330 


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Mr. Craik cleared his throat. “I failed to catch 
quite all that the maid said,” he murmured apolo- 
getically; “but I certainly did gather it was to 
some kind of — of emanation she was referring. 
And the 'ruin,^ you know. I 'm not a mystic; 
and yet do you know, that somehow seemed to me 
almost offensively suggestive of — of daemonic in- 
fluence. You don’t suppose, Mrs. Lawford — and 
of course I would n’t for a moment venture on 
such a conjecture unsupported — but even if this 
restless spirit (let us call it) did succeed in making 
a footing, it might possibly be rather in the nature 
of a lodging than a permanent residence. More- 
over, we are, I think, bound to remember that 
probably in all spheres of existence like attracts 
like; even the Gadarene episode seems to suggest 
a possible multiplication!” he peered largely. 
“You don’t suppose, Mrs. Lawford . . . ?” 

“I think Mr. Craik does n’t quite relish having 
to break the news, Sheila dear,” explained Mrs. 
Lovat soothingly, “that perhaps Sabathier’s out. 
Which really is quite a heavenly suggestion, for 
in that case your husband would be in, would n’t 
he? Just our old stolid Arthur again, you know. 
And next Mr. Craik is suggesting, and it certainly 
does seem rather fascinating, that poor Ada ’s got 
mixed up with the Frenchman’s friends, or perhaps, 
even, with one of the seventy- two princes royal. 
I know women can’t or must n’t reason, Mr. Dan- 
ton, but you do, I hope, just catch the drift?” 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 331 


Danton started. ‘‘I wasn't really listening to 
the girl," he explained nonchalantly, shrugging his 
black shoulders and pursing up his eyes. '‘Per- 
sonally, Mrs. Lovat, I ’d pack the baggage off to- 
night, box and all. But it 's not my business." 

"You mustn't be depressed — must he, Mr. 
Craik? After all, my dear man, the business, as 
you call it, is not exactly entailed. But really, 
Sheila, I think it must be getting very late. Mr. 
Bethany won't come now. And the dear old thing 
ought certainly to have his say, before we go any 
further; oughtn't he, Mr. Danton? So what's 
the use of worriting poor Ada's ghost any longer. 
And as for poor Arthur — I haven’t the faintest 
desire in the world to hear the little cart drive up, 
simply in case it should be to leave your unfor- 
tunate husband behind it, Sheila. What it must 
be to be alone all night in this house with a dead 
and buried Frenchman's face — ^well, I shudder, 
dear!” 

"And yet, Mrs. Lovat," said Mr. Craik, with 
some little show of returning gaiety,” as we make 
our bed, you know.” 

"But in this case, you see," she replied reflect- 
ively, "if all accounts are true, Mr. Craik, it 's mani- 
festly the wicked Frenchman who has made the 
bed, and Sheila who refu — But look! Mr. 
Danton is fretting to get home." 

"If you'll all go to the door," said Danton 
seizing a fleeting opportunity to raise his eye- 


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brows more expressively even than if he had 
again shrugged his shoulders at Sheila, ‘‘I ’ll put 
out the light.” 

The night air flowed into the dark house as 
Danton slowly felt his way out of the dining-room. 
^‘There’s only one thing,” said Sheila slowly. 
‘‘When I last saw my husband, you know, he was, 
I think, the least bit better. He was always 
stubbornly convinced it would all come right in 
time. That ’s why, I think, he ’s been spending 
all his evenings away from home. But supposing 
it did?” 

“For my part,” said Mrs. Lovat, breathing the 
faint wind that was rising out of the west, “I’d 
sigh; I ’d rub my eyes; I ’d thank God for such an 
exciting dream ; and I ’d turn comfortably over and 
go to sleep again. I ’m all for Arthur, back against 
the wall.” 

“For my part,” said Danton, looming in the 
dusk, “friend or no friend, I ’d cut the — I ’d cut 
him dead. But don’t fret, Mrs. Lawford, devil or 
no devil, he ’s gone for good.” 

“And for my part — ” began Mr. Craik; but 
the door at that moment slammed. 

Voices, however, broke out almost immediately 
in the porch. And after a hurried consultation, 
Lawford in his stagnant retreat heard the door 
softly reopened, and the striking of a match. And 
Mr. Craik, followed closely by Danton’s great body, 
stole circumspectly across his dim chink, and the 


Lawford’s Case is Discussed 333 


first adventurer went stumbling down the kitchen 
staircase. 

“I suppose,” muttered Lawford, turning his 
head in the darkness, “they have come back to 
put out the kitchen gas.” 

Danton began a busy, tuneless whistle between 
his teeth. 

“Coming, Craik?” he called thickly, after a long 
pause. 

Apparently no answer had been returned to his 
inquiry: he waited a little longer, with legs apart, 
and eyeballs enveloped in brooding darkness. 
“I ’ll just go and tell the ladies you ’re coming,” he 
suddenly bawled down the hollow. “ Do you hear, 
Craik? They ’re alone, you know.” And with 
that he resolutely wheeled and rapidly made his 
way down the steps into the garden. Some few 
moments afterwards Mr. Craik shook himself free 
of the basement, hastened at a gentle trot to re- 
join his companions, and in his absence of mind 
omitted to shut the front door. 


CHAPTER XXIII 


AN OLD lady’s VISIT 

Lawford sat on in the darkness, and now one 
sentence and now another of their talk would 
repeat itself in his memory, in much the same way 
as one listlessly turns over an antiquated diary, 
to read here and there a faded, almost mean- 
ingless sentiment. Sometimes a footstep passed 
echoing along the path under the trees, then his 
thoughts would leave him, and he would listen 
and listen till it died quite out. It was all so 
very far away. And they too — these talkers — 
so very far away ; as remote and yet as clear as 
the characters that have made their final bow, 
and have left the curtained stage, and one is 
standing uncompanioned and nearly the last 
of the spectators, and the lights that have 
summoned back reality are being extinguished. 
It was only by a painful effort of mind that he 
kept recalling himself to himself — why he was 
here; what it all meant; that this was indeed 
reality. 

Yet, after all, this by now was his customary 
334 


335 


An Old Lady’s Visit 

loneliness: there was little else he desired for 
the present than the hospitality of the dark. He 
glanced around him in the clear, black, stirless 
air. Here and there, it seemed, a humped or 
spindled form held against all comers its passive 
place. Here and there a tiny faintness of light 
played. Night after night these chairs and 
tables kept their blank vigil. Why, he thought, 
pleased as an over-tired child with the fancy, 
in a sense they were always alone, shut up in 
a kind of senselessness — just like us all. But 
what — he had suddenly risen from his chair 
to ask himself — what on earth are they alone 
with? No precise answer had been forthcom- 
ing to that question. But as in turning in the 
doorway, he looked out into the night, flashing 
here and there in dark spaces of the sky above 
the withering apple leaves, the long dark wall, 
and quiet, untrodden road, with the tumultuous 
beating of the stars — one thing at least he was 
conscious of having learned in these last few days : 
he knew what kind of a place he was alone in. 
It seemed to weave a spell over him, to call 
up a nostalgia he had lost all remembrance of 
since childhood. And that queer homesickness, 
at any rate, was all Sabathier’s doing, he thought, 
smiling in his rather careworn fashion. Saba- 
thier! It was this mystery, bereft now of all 
fear, and this beauty together, that made life 
the endless, changing, and yet changeless 


336 


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thing it was. And yet mystery and loveliness 
alike were only really appreciable with one’s 
legs, as it were, dangling over into one’s grave. 

Just with one’s lantern lit, on the edge of the 
whispering unknown, and a reiterated going 
back out of the solitude into the light and warmth, 
to the voices and glancing of eyes, to say good- 
bye: — that after all was this life on earth for 
those who watched as well as acted. What if 
one’s earthly home were empty? — still the rest- 
less, fretted traveller must tarry; ^‘for the hor- 
rible worst of it is, my friend,” he said, as if to 
some silent companion listening behind him, 
^‘the worst of it is, your way was just simply, 
solely suicide. ” What was it Herbert had called 
it? Yes, a cul-de-sac — black, lofty, immensely 
still and old and picturesque, but none the less 
merely a contemptible cul-de-sac ; no abiding place, 
scarcely even sufficing with its flagstones for 
a groan from the fugitive and deluded refugee. 
There was no peace for the wicked. The question 
of course then came in — Was there any peace 
anywhere, for anybody? 

He smiled at a sudden odd remembrance of 
a quiet, sardonic old aunt whom he used to stay 
with as a child. “Children should be seen and 
not heard,” she would say, peering at him over 
his favourite pudding. 

His eyes rested vacantly on the darkling street. 
He fell again into a reverie, gigantically brooded 


337 


An Old Lady’s Visit 

over by shapes only imagination dimly conceived 
of: the remote alleys of his mind astir with a 
shadowy and ceaseless traffic which it was n’t at 
least this life’s business to hearken after, or re- 
gard. And as he stood there in a mysteriously, yet 
thronging peaceful solitude such as he had never 
known before, faintly out of the silence broke the 
sound of approaching hoofs. His heart seemed 
to gather itself close; a momentary blindness 
veiled his eyes, so wildly had his blood surged 
up into cheek and brain. He remained, caught 
up, with head slightly inclined, listening, as, with 
an interminable tardiness, measureless, anguished 
hope died down into nothingness. Cold and 
heavy, his heart began to beat again, as if to 
catch up those laggard moments. He turned 
with an infinite revulsion of feeling to look 
out on the lamps of the old fly that had 
drawn up at his gate. 

He watched incuriously a little old lady rather 
arduously alight, pause, and look up at his dark- 
ened windows, and after a momentary hesitation, 
and a word over her shoulder to the cabman, 
stoop and fumble at the iron latch. He watched 
her with a kind of wondering aversion, still 
scarcely tinged with curiosity. She had suc- 
ceeded in lifting the latch and in pushing her way 
through, and was even now steadily advancing 
towards him along the tiled path. And a minute 
after he recognised with the warmest of reactions 


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the quiet old figure that had shared a sunset with 
him ages and ages ago — ^his mother’s old school- 
fellow, Miss Sinnet. 

He was already ransacking the still faintly 
perfumed dining-room for the matches, and had 
just succeeded in relighting the still warm lamp, 
when he heard her quiet step in the porch, even 
felt her peering in, in the gloom, with all her 
years’ trickling customariness behind her, a little 
dubious of knocking on a wide-open door. 

But the lamp lit, Lawford went out again and 
welcomed his visitor. ^T am alone,” he was 
explaining gravely, ^‘my wife’s away and the 
whole house topsy-turvy. How very, very, kind 
of you!” 

The old lady was breathing a little heavily 
after her ascent of the steep steps, and seemed 
not to have noticed his outstretched hand. None 
the less she followed him in, and when she was 
well advanced into the lighted room, she sighed 
deeply, raised her veil over the front of her bonnet, 
and leisurely took out her spectacles. 

‘T suppose,” she was explaining in a little 
quiet voice, '‘you are Mr. Arthur Lawford, but 
as I did not catch sight of a light in any of the 
windows I began to fear that the cabman might 
have set me down at the wrong house.” 

She raised her head, and first through, and 
then over her spectacles she deliberately and 
steadfastly regarded him. 


339 


An Old Lady’s Visit 

“Yes,” she said to herself, and turned, not 
as it seemed entirely with satisfaction, to look 
for a chair. He wheeled the most comfortable 
one up to the table. 

“ I have been visiting my old friend Miss Tucker 
— Rev. W. Tucker’s daughter — she, I knew, 
could give me your address; and sure enough 
she did. Your road, d ’ye see, was on my way 
home. And I determined, in spitQ of the hour, 
just to inquire. You must understand, Mr. 
Lawford, there was something that I rather par- 
ticularly wanted to say to you. But there! — 
you ’re looking sadly, sadly ill; and,” she glanced 
round a little inquisitively, “I think my story 
had better wait for a more convenient occasion.” 

“Not at all. Miss Sinnet: please not,” Lawford 
assured her, “really. I have been ill, but I’m 
now practically quite myself- again. My wife 
and daughter have gone away for a few days; 
and I follow to-morrow, so if you ’ll forgive such 
a very poor welcome, it may be my — my only 
chance. Do please let me hear!” 

The old lady leant back in her chair, placed 
her hands on the arms and softly panted, while 
out of the rather broad serenity of her face she 
sat blinking up at her companion as if after a long 
talk instead of at the beginning of one. “No,” 
she repeated reflectively, “I don’t like your looks 
at all; yet here we are now, enjoying beautiful 
autumn weather; why not make use of it?” 


340 


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“Oh, yes,” said Lawford, “I do. I have been 
making tremendous use of it.” 

Her eyelid flickered at his candid glance. 
“And does your business permit of much walking, 
sir?” 

“Well, I’ve been malingering these last few 
days — sidling at home; but I am always more or 
less my own man. Miss Sinnet. I walk a little. ” 

“H’m, but not much in my direction, Mr. 
Lawford?” she quizzed him. 

“All horrible indolence. Miss Sinnet. But I 
often — often think of you; and especially just 
lately.” 

“Well, now,” she wriggled round her head to 
get a better view of him wheeling up his chair, 
“that’s very peculiar; because, Mr. Lawford, 
I ’ve been thinking lately a very great deal of you. 
And yet — I fancy I shall succeed in mystifying 
you presently — not precisely of you, but of some- 
body else!” 

“You do mystify me — horribly,” he replied 
gallantly. “And that is the story, I suppose?” 

“That’s the story,” repeated Miss Sinnet with 
some little triumph. “Now, let me see; it was on 
Saturday last — yes, Saturday evening; a wonder- 
ful simset ; Bewley Heath, Mr. Lawford. ” 

“Oh yes; my daughter’s favourite walk.” 

“And your daughter’s age now?” 

“She’s nearly sixteen; Alice, you know.” 

“Ah, yes, Alice; to be sure. It is a beautiful 


341 


An Old Lady’s Visit 

walk, and if fine, I generally take mine there too. 
It ’s near; there ’s shade; it ’s very little frequented; 
and I can wander and muse undisturbed. And 
that I think is pretty well all that an old woman 
like me is fit for, Mr. Lawford. ‘Nearly sixteen!’ 
Is it possible? Dear, dear me ! But let me get on. 
On my way home from the Heath, you may be 
aware, before one reaches the road again, there ’s 
a somewhat steep ascent. I have n’t the strength 
I had, and whether I ’m fatigued or not, I have 
always made it a rule to rest a while on a most 
convenient little seat at the summit, admire the 
view — what I can see of it — and then make my 
way quietly, quietly home. On Saturday, how- 
ever, and it most rarely occurs — once, I remem- 
ber, when a very civil nursemaid was sitting with 
two charmingly behaved little children in the 
sunshine, and I heard they were my old friend 
Major Loder’s son's children — on Saturday, as 
I was saying, my own particular little haunt was 
already occupied” — she glanced back at him 
from out of her thoughts, as it were — ‘‘by a 
gentleman. I say, gentleman; though I must 
confess that his conduct, perhaps, too, a little 
something even in his appearance, somewhat 
belied the term. Anyhow, gentleman let us call 
him. ” 

Lawford, all attention, nodded, and encourag- 
ingly smiled. 

“I’m not one of those tiresome, suspicious 


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people, Mr. Lawford, who distrust all strangers. 
I have never once been molested; and I have 
enjoyed many and many a most interesting, and 
sometimes instructive, talk with an individual 
whom I We ever seen in my life before, and this 
side of the grave, perhaps, am never likely to see 
again.” She lifted her head with pursed lips, 
and gravely yet still flickeringly regarded him 
once more. “Well, I made some trifling remark 
— the weather, the view, what-not, ” she explained 
with a little jerk of her shoulder, “and to my 
extreme astonishment he turned and addressed 
me by name — Miss Sinnet. Unmistakably — 
Sinnet. Now, perhaps, and very rightly, you 
won’t consider that a very peculiar thing to do. 
But you will recollect, Mr. Lawford, that I had 
been sitting there a considerable time. Surely, 
now, if you had recognised my face you would 
have addressed me at once?” 

“Was he, do you think. Miss Sinnet, a little 
uncertain, perhaps?” 

“Never mind, never mind; let me get on with 
my story first. The next thing my gentleman 
does is more mysterious still. His whole manner 
was a little peculiar, perhaps — a certain restless- 
ness, what, in fact, one might be almost tempted 
to call a certain furtiveness of behaviour. Never 
mind. What he does next is to ask me a rid- 
dle! Perhaps you won’t think that was peculiar 
either?” 


343 


An Old Lady’s Visit 

“What was the riddle?” smiled Lawford. 

“Why, to be sure, to guess his name! Simply 
guided, so I surmised, by some very faint resem- 
blance in his face to his mother, who was, he assured 
me, an old schoolfellow of mine at Brighton. I 
thought and thought. I confess the adventure 
was beginning to be extremely entertaining. But 
of course, very, very few of my old schoolfellows 
remain distinctly in my memory nqw; and I fear 
that grows more treacherous the longer I live. 
Their faces as girls are clear enough. But later 
in life most of them drifted out of sight — many, 
alas! are dead; and, well, at last I narrowed my 
man down to one. And who, now, do you suppose 
that was?” 

Lawford sustained an expression of abysmal 
mystification. “Do tell me — who?” 

“Your own poor dear mother, Mr. Lawford.” 

“He said so?” 

“No, no, ” said the old lady, with some vexation, 
closing her eyes. “/ said so. He asked me to 
guess. And I guessed Mary Lawford; now do 
you see?” 

“Yes, yes. But was he like her. Miss Sinnet? 
That was really very, very extraordinary. Did 
you see any likeness in his face?” 

Miss Sinnet very deliberately took her specta- 
cles out of their case again. “Now, see here, sir; 
this is being practical, isn’t it? I’m just going 
to take a leisurely glance at yours. But you 


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mustn’t let me forget the time. You must look 
after the time for me.” 

'Tt’s just a quarter to ten,” said Lawford, 
having glanced first at the stopped clock on the 
chimney-piece and then at his watch; and then 
sat quite still, and endeavoured to sit at his ease, 
while the old lady lifted her bonneted head, and 
ever so gravely and benignly surveyed him. 

^‘H’m, ” she said at last. “There ’s no mistak- 
ing you. It ’s Mary’s chin, and Mary’s brow — 
with just a little something, perhaps, of her dreamy 
eye. But you have n’t her looks, Mr. Lawford, 
by any manner of means. She was a very beauti- 
ful girl, and so vivacious, and so fanciful — it was, 
I suppose, the foreign strain showing itself — even 
marriage did not quite succeed in spoiling her.” 

“The foreign strain?” Lawford glanced with 
a kind of fleeting fixity at the quiet old figure; 
“the foreign strain?” 

“Your mother’s maiden name, my dear Mr. 
Lawford, surely memory does not deceive me in 
that, was Van der Gucht. Thaty I believe, is a 
foreign name.” 

“Ah, yes,” said Lawford, his rising thoughts 
sinking quietly to rest again. “Van der Gucht, 
of course. How stupid of me!” 

“As a matter of fact, your mother was very 
proud of her Dutch blood. But there, ” she flung 
out little finlike sleeves, “if you don’t let me 
keep to my story I shall go back as tmeasy as 


An Old Lady’s Visit 345 

I came. And you didn’t, ” she added even more 
fretfully, “you didn’t tell me the time!” 

Lawford stared at his watch again for some 
few moments without replying. “It’s a few 
moments to ten,” he said at last. 

“Dear me! And I’m keeping the cabman! 
I must hurry on. Well, now, I put it to you, 
you shall be my father confessor — though I detest 
the idea in real life — was I wrong? • Was I justified 
in professing to the poor fellow that I detected 
a likeness when there wasn’t any likeness there?” 

^ ‘ What ! N one at all ! ” cried Lawford ; ‘ ‘ not the 
faintest trace?” 

“My dear, good Mr. Lawford,” she expostu- 
lated, patting her lap, “there’s very little more 
than a trace of my dear beautiful Mary in yoUy 
her own son. How could there be — how could 
you expect it in him, a complete stranger? No, 
it was nothing but my own foolish kindliness. 
It might have been Mary’s son for all that I could 
recollect. I haven’t for years, please remember, 
had the pleasure of receiving a visit from you, 
I am firmly of the opinion that I was justified. 
My motive was entirely benevolent. And then — 
to my positive amazement — well, I won’t say 
hard things of the absent; but he suddenly turns 
round on me with a ‘Thank you. Miss Bennett.’ 
Bennett, hark ye! Perhaps you won’t agree that 
I had any justification in being vexed and — and 
affronted at thatl'^ 


346 


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‘T think, Miss Sinnet,” said Lawford solemnly, 
that you were perfectly justified. Oh, perfectly ! 
I wonder even you had the patience to give the 
real Arthur Lawford a chance to ask your forgive- 
ness for — ^for the stranger.” 

“ Well, candidly, sir, ” said Miss Sinnet severely, 
“I was very much scandalised; and I shouldn't 
be here now telling you my story if it had n't been 
for your mother.'' 

“My mother!” 

The old lady rather grimly enjoyed his con- 
fusion. “Yes, Mr. Lawford, your mother. I 
don't know why — something in his manner, 
something in his face — so dejected, so imhappy, 
so — if it is not uncharitable to say it — so wild: 
it has haunted me: I haven’t been able to get 
the matter out of my head. I have lain awake 
in my bed thinking of him. Why did he speak 
to me? I keep asking myself. Why did he 
play me so very aimless a trick? How had he 
learned my name? Why was he sitting there 
so solitary and so dejected? And worse even than 
that, what has become of him? A little more 
patience, a little more charity, perhaps! What 
might I not have done for him ! The whole thing 
has harassed and distressed me more than I can 
say. Would you believe it, I have actually 
twice, and on one occasion, three times in a day 
made my way to the seat — hoping to see him there. 
And I am not so young as I was. And then. 


347 


An Old Lady’s Visit 

as I say, to crown all, I had a most remarkable 
dream about your mother. But that 's my own 
affair. Elderly people like me are used — well, 
perhaps I won't say used — we 're not surprised 
or disturbed by visits from those who have gone 
before. We live, in a sense, among the tombs; 
though I would not have you fancy it 's in any 
way a morbid or unhappy life to lead. We don't 
talk about it — certainly not to young people. 
Let them enjoy their Eden while they can; though 
there 's plenty of apples, I fear, on that tree yet, 
Mr. Lawford." 

She leant forward and whispered it with a big, 
simple smile — ^‘We don't even discuss it much 
among ourselves. But as one gets nearer and 
nearer to the wicket-gate there 's other company 
around one than you ’ll find in — in the directory. 
And that is why I have just come on here to-night. 
Very, very likely my errand may seem to have 
no meaning for you. You look ill, sir, but you 
don't appear to be in any great trouble or adver- 
sity, as I feared in my — well, there — as I feared 
you might be. I must say, though, it seems a 
terribly empty house, and no lights, too!" 

She slowly, with a little trembling nodding 
of her bonnet, turned her head and glanced quietly 
but unflinchingly out of the half-open door. But 
that's not my affair." And again she looked 
at him for a little while. 

Then she stooped forward and touched him 


348 


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kindly and trustingly on the knee. ^‘Trouble or 
no trouble/’ she said, ^‘it ’s never too late to re- 
mind a man of his mother. And I ’m sure, Mr. 
Lawford, I ’m very glad to hear you are struggling 
up out of your illness again. We must keep 
a brave heart, forty or seventy, whichever we 
may be: ^ While the evil days come not nor the 
years draw nigh when thou shalt say, I have no 
pleasure in them,’ though they have not come 
to me even yet; and I trust from the bottom of 
my heart, not to you,'*^ 

She looked at him without a trace of emotion 
or constraint in her large quiet face, and their 
eyes met for a moment in that brief, fixed, baffling 
fashion that seems to prove that mankind is after 
all but a dumb masked creature saddled with 
the vain illusion of speech. 

“And now that I’ve eased my conscience,” 
said the old lady, pulling down her veil, “I must 
beg pardon for intruding at such an hour of the 
evening. And may I have your arm down those 
dreadful steps? Really, Mr. Lawford, judging 
from the houses they erect for us, the builders 
must have a very peculiar notion of mankind. 
Is the fly still there? I expressly told the man 
to wait, and what I am going to do if !” 

“He’s there,” Lawford reassured her, craning 
his neck in their slow progress to catch a peep 
into the quiet road. And like a flock of birds 
scared by a chance comer at their feeding in some 


349 


An Old Lady’s Visit 

deserted field, a whirring cloud of memories swept 
softly up in his mind — memories whose import 
he made no effort to discover. None the less, 
the leisurely descent became, in their company, 
something of a real experience even in such a 
brimming week. 

“I hope, some day, you will really tell me your 
dream,” he said, pushing the old lady’s silk 
skirts in after her as she slowly climbed into the 
carriage. 

*‘Ah, my dear man, when you’re my age,” 
she called back to him, groping her way into the 
rather musty gloom, “you’ll dream such dreams 
for yourself. Life ’s not what ’s just the fashion. 
And there are queerer things to be seen and heard 
just quietly in one’s solitude than this busy life 
gives us time to discover. But as for my mysti- 
fying Bewley acquaintance — I confess I cannot 
make head or tail of him. ” 

“Was he, ” said Lawford rather vaguely, looking 
up into the dim white face that with its plumes 
filled nearly the whole carriage window, “was 
his face very unpleasing?” 

She raised a gloved hand. “It has haunteb 
me, haunted me, Mr. Lawford; its — its conflict! 
Poor fellow; I hope, I do hope, he faced his trouble 
out. But I shall never see him again.” 

He squeezed the trembling, kindly old hand. 
“I bet. Miss Sinnet,” he said earnestly, “even 
your having thought kindly of the poor beggar 


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eases his mind — whoever he may be. It would 
have eased mine.’' 

Ay, but I did more than think replied the old 
lady with a chuckle, that might have seemed even 
a little derisive if it had not been so profoundly 
magnanimous. 

He watched the old black fly roll slowly off, 
and still smiling at Miss Sinnet’s inscrutable 
finesse went back into the house. “And now, my 
friend,” he said, addressing peacefully the throng- 
ing darkness, “the time 's nearly up for me to go 
too.” 

He had made up his mind. Or rather, it seemed 
as if in the unregarded silences of this last long 
talk his mind had made up itself. Only among 
impossibilities had he the shadow of a choice. 
In this old haunted house, amid this shallow 
turmoil, no practical clue could show itself of a 
way out. He would go away for a while. 

He left the door ajar behind him for the mo- 
ments still left, and stood for a while thinking. 
Then, lamp in hand, he ascended into the break- 
fast-room for pen, ink, and paper. He sat for 
some time in that underground calm, nibbling 
his pen like a harassed and self-conscious school- 
boy. At last he began: 

“My dear Sheila, — I must tell you to begin 
with that the change has now all passed away. I 
am completely myself again. And next: that I 


351 


An Old Lady’s Visit 

overheard all that was said to-night in the dining- 
room. I ’m sorry for listening; but it ’s no good 
going over all that now. Here I am, and, as you 
said, for Alice’s sake we must make the best of 
it. I am going away for a while, to get, if I can, 
a chance to quiet down. I suppose every one 
comes sooner or later to a time in life when there 
is nothing else to be done but just shut one’s eyes 
and blunder on. And that ’s all I' can do now — 
blunder on. ...” 

He paused, and suddenly, at the echo of the 
words in his mind, a revulsion of feeling — shame 
and hatred of himself surged up, and he tore his 
letter into tiny pieces. Once more he began, 
‘*My dear Sheila,” dropped his pen, and sat on 
for a long time, cold and inert, harbouring almost 
unendurably a pitiful, hopeless longing. . . . 
He would write to Grisel another day. 

He leant back in his chair, his fingers pressed 
against his eyelids. And clearer than those 
which myriad-hued reality can ever present, 
pictures of the imagination swam up before his 
eyes. It seemed, indeed, that even now some 
ghost, some revenant of himself was sitting there, 
in the old green churchyard, roofed only with a 
thousand thousand stars. The breath of darkness 
stirred softly on his cheek. Some little scampering 
shape slipped by. A bird on high cried weirdly, 
solemnly, over the globe. He shuddered faintly. 


352 


The Return 


and looked out again into the small lamplit room. 
Here, too, was quite as inexplicable a coming 
and going. A fly was walking on the table be- 
neath his eyes, with the uneasy gait of one that 
has outlived his hour and most of his companions. 

Mice were scampering and shrieking in the 
empty kitchen. And all about him, in the view- 
less air, the phantoms of another life passed by, 
unmindful of his motionless body. He fell into a 
lethargy of the senses, and only gradually became 
aware, after a while, of the strange, long-drawn 
sigh of rain at the window. He rose and opened 
it. The night-air flowed in, chilled with the rain 
and faintly fragrant of the dust. It soothed away 
all thought for a while. He turned back to his 
chair. He would wait until the rain had a little 
lulled before starting. 

A little before twelve the door was softly, 
and with extreme care, pushed open, and Mr. 
Bethany’s old face, with an intense and sharpened 
scrutiny, looked in on the lamplit room. And as 
if still intent on the least sound within the empty 
walls around him, he came near, and stooping 
across the table, stared through his spectacles at 
the sidelong face of his friend, so still, with hands 
so lightly laid on the arms of his chair that he 
had need to watch closely to detect in his heavy 
slumber the slow, measured rise and fall of his 
breast. 

He turned wearily away muttering a little, 


353 


An Old Lady’s Visit 

between an immeasurable relief and a now almost 
intolerable medley of vexations. What was this 
monstrous web of Craik’s? What had the crea- 
ture been nodding and ducketing about? — those 
whisperings, that tattling? And what in the end, 
when you were old and sour and out-strategied, 
what was the end to be of this urgent dream 
called Life? 

He sat down quietly and drew his hands over 
his face, pushed his lean, knotted fingers up under 
his spectacles, then sat blinking softly, slowly 
deciphering the solitary “My dear Sheila” on 
Lawford’s note-paper. “ H’m, ” he muttered, and 
looked up again at the dark, still eyelids that in 
the strange torpor of sleep might yet be dimly 
conveying to the dreaming brain behind them 
some hint of his presence. “I wish to goodness, 
you wonderful old creature,” he muttered, 
wagging his head, “I wish to goodness you’d 
wake up. ” 

For some time he sat on, listening to the still 
soft downpour on the fading leaves. “They 
don’t come to me!” he said softly again, with 
a tiny smile on his face. “ It ’s that old mediaeval 
Craik: with a face like a last year’s rookery!” 
And again he sat, with head a little sidelong, 
listening now to the infinitesimal sounds of life 
without, now to the thoughts within, and ever 
and again gazed steadfastly on Lawford. 

At last it seemed in the haunted quietness other 


23 


354 


The Return 


thoughts came to him. A cloud, as it were of 
youth, drew over the wrinkled skin, composed 
the birdlike keenness; his head nodded. Once, 
like Lawford in the darkness at Widderstone, 
he glanced up sharply across the lamplight at his 
phantasmagorical shadowy companion, heard the 
steady surge of multitudinous rain -drops, like 
the roar of Time’s winged chariot hurrying near; 
then he, too, with spectacles awry, bobbed on in 
his chair, a weary old sentinel on the outskirts of 
his friend’s denuded battle-field. 


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